Canada’s unemployment rate edged down to 5.7% last month from 5.8% in March as the economy added a record 106,500 jobs.
It’s the biggest one-month employment surge since the government started collecting comparable data in 1976.
Economists had expected a gain of 10,000 jobs for the month and the unemployment rate to remain at 5.8%.
Provincially, Ontario’s April unemployment rate was at 6%, up slightly from 5.9% last month.
In the part of Ontario that includes the Quinte region the unemployment rate was 5.4% last month, down from 5.5% in March.
Here are some other national unemployment numbers from last month (March numbers in brackets):
- Unemployment rate: 5.7 per cent (5.8)
- Employment rate: 62.1 per cent (61.9)
- Participation rate: 65.9 per cent (65.7)
- Number unemployed: 1,158,700 (1,157,200)
- Number working: 19,029,100 (18,922,600)
- Youth (15-24 years) unemployment rate: 10.3 per cent (10.7)
- Men (25 plus) unemployment rate: 5.2 per cent (5.2)
- Women (25 plus) unemployment rate: 4.7 per cent (4.7)
