QUEENS PARK – Employment in Ontario increased by 43,500 jobs in November — the fifth straight month of job gains — and the unemployment rate decreased to 5.5 percent, the lowest it has been since 2000.
Since last November, employment in Ontario is up by 180,800 jobs. Ontario’s unemployment rate has been below the national average for 32 consecutive months and below six percent for the past four months — a first since 2000. Ontario has now created more than 800,000 net new jobs since the depths of the recession.
According to 2017 Ontario Economic Outlook and Fiscal Review, Ontario is forecasting real GDP growth of 2.8 percent in 2017, which surpasses earlier projections. Ontario’s economy has grown faster than Canada’s and those of all other G7 nations for the past three years.
Ontario’s plan to create fairness and opportunity during this period of rapid economic change includes a higher minimum wage and better working conditions, free tuition for hundreds of thousands of students, easier access to affordable child care, and free prescription drugs for everyone under 25 through the biggest expansion of Medicare in a generation.
Quick Facts
- Ontario added 25,300 full-time jobs and 18,200 part-time jobs in November.
- Employment growth has occurred in many economic regions across the province, year-over-year increases include Northwest Ontario (4.9 percent), Kitchener-Waterloo-Barrie (3.9 percent) and Stratford-Bruce Peninsula (3.8 percent).
- The employment increase was led by monthly gains in the wholesale and retail trade, manufacturing, and educational services sectors. The unemployment rate was 5.5 per cent.
- In 2016, Ontario employment increased by 76,400 net new jobs.
- Ontario’s Business Growth Initiative is a five-year commitment of more than $650 million to grow the economy and create jobs by promoting an innovation-based economy, helping small companies scale-up and modernizing regulations for businesses.
