Unemployment in Canada

As many countries are experiencing troubled economics, including high unemployment rates, Canada is still doing well for themselves through these times. Over the past 12 months, Canada’s unemployment rate rose up 1.2% giving us a total of 7.5% unemployment. Some of the main causes of unemployment are: frictional, seasonal, structural, cyclical and just not having enough job sources provided to employers. The most normal unemployment type is frictional and the most serious is structural. Right now I’m going to talk about seasonal and youth unemployment because it’s the type that could be associated with my age group. Seasonal unemployment is caused by economic slowdowns related to seasonal changes. Great examples of seasonal businesses are Canada’s Wonderland, Halloween costume stores or ski resorts. All three of these businesses are affected once their associated season changes. Most of the employees for these businesses tend to be youths. Youths look for jobs to make quick money for the summer of whatever it is, even if it’s seasonal. The downfall about working at seasonal places is once the seasons up, those employees are left unemployed increasing Canada’s rate. According to statistics for 2011, Canada’s youth unemployment rate was 15% which is not that great but in comparison to other countries such as Spain with 44% unemployment for youth, is very good.

Youths in Canada may complain about the difficulty in landing a solid part time job, but we should count our blessings that we have more job opportunities here then different parts of the world. The most beneficial thing about Canada is that they offer help and service support to youths to try and find jobs, such as YES (Youth Employment Strategy) and other routes that help youths land a job. Unemployment rates decrease as age increases. Youths are at the bottom of the list making that the most difficult time to get a job, but once they age, there are more job opportunities provided making it easier for adults to land a full time job.