Local jobless rate down 1.4 per cent over last year
By Collin Gallant on January 5, 2019.
Medicine Hat News Unemployment fell in most of Alberta’s seven major economic regions during December, including a 1.4 percentage point drop in Lethbridge-Medicine Hat area year-over-year, according to Statistics Canada data released Friday. The local region’s jobless rate of 4.5 per cent for last month is below the 5.9 per cent figure from December 2017, but higher than the 3.9 per cent from the previous month. In the year-over-year numbers, preferred by economists to account for seasonal work, five other Alberta regions saw a decline in unemployment, though the southern Alberta region’s decrease was the largest. The provincial rate ticked up one-10th of a point from the previous month to 6.4 per cent, but is down from 7.0 per cent during the same time last year. Overall, 21,000 more Albertans were working than in late 2017. Alberta’s rate is still above the national figure of 5.6 per cent, the nation’s lowest rate in British Columbia (4.4 per cent), or Saskatchewan’s rate, also 5.6 per cent. In rural Alberta, joblessness rose in the Camrose-Drumheller region to 7.0 per cent, up 1 percentage point, but other areas outside major centres saw decreases, including Red Deer (now at 4.4. per cent), Wood Buffalo (5.1 per cent) and Banff-Grande Prairie (5.2 per cent). Calgary’s unadjusted rate fell from 7.2 to 7.0 per cent, but in a three-month rolling average gained one-10th of a per cent to sit at 7.6. Edmonton’s dropped to 6.2 per cent from 7.3. 9-8
