Canada's Job Market Slows Amid Tariff Pressure
Canada's economy lost 42,000 jobs in August, marking a slowdown after months of strong employment gains. The unemployment rate remained at 6.4 percent, missing economists' expectations of adding about 15,000 jobs.
The decline follows a string of positive reports between April and July, when Canada added 181,000 positions and the unemployment rate fell by half a percentage point. However, the public sector lost 20,000 jobs in August, its third consecutive monthly decline.
Manufacturing, on the other hand, added 22,000 jobs despite pressure from US tariffs. Young Canadians aged 15 to 24 lost 19,000 jobs during the month, while average hourly wage growth slowed to two percent year-on-year, its weakest annual increase since November 2017.
CIBC senior economist Andrew Grantham said the figures reinforce expectations that Canadian economic growth will slow during the third quarter. TD Bank senior economist Andrew Hencic noted that a step backwards is not a major surprise after a string of hot reports.