Employment fell by more than 1-million jobs in Canada in March, a 5.3 per cent decline.
The employment rate, which is the proportion of people 15 and older who are employed, fell just over 3 per centage points to 58.5 per cent, the lowest since April of 1997.
Statistics Canada has released its monthly labour force survey, and the March results include the first labour market effects related to COVID-19.
There are a lot of different scenarios with layoffs, temporary layoffs, reduced hours, and being off to take care of family members.
The unemployment rate rose by 2.2 percentage points to 7.8 per cent, which is the largest one month increase since Statistics Canada began tallying the data in 1976.
An unusual statistic for the first month that COVD-19 really took hold across Canada is that there are people not in the labour force who worked earlier in March, but weren’t counted as unemployed because of the ongoing business shutdowns and the requirement to socially isolate.
If these 219-thousand people were counted as unemployed, the adjusted rate would be 8.9 per cent.
In Saskatchewan, employment is down 3.6 per cent. Quebec had the largest drop at 6 per cent followed by Ontario at a 5.3 per cent.