I am so sorry for all the people who have lost their jobs. I hope all of you will find a light at the end of this scary tunnel. Funny how all the powers that be are insisting the bad times are over hey?

It is actually not funny (assuming that is meant as strange or curious)

The figures are for June. July has passed us and August is almost over. So this is a retrospective of how things were at the end of June. Not too many were talking about a turn around yet at that time.

Those who think the bads times are or may be over are looking at leading indicators such as consumer confidence, stock markets, etc. rather than lagging indicators such as the above.

Thus, both can be very accurate since they report tow different things.

The good news?????

The Canadian increase from October 2008 to June 2009 was 63.2%.

The PG increase from June 2008 to June 2009 was 67%. Given what has happend to the forest industry, the fact that we have not done substantially worse than the Canadian average is good news from my point of view.

I still have a problem with the reporting of statistical information. Why do we not have the annual figure for Canada - June to June rather than October to June? It makes it very difficult to compare apples to apples.

When in doubt, always go to the source, right?

Here is the source, statscan

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/daily-quotidien/090825/t090825a4-eng.htm

Percentage increase from June 2008 to June 2009

CITY ..... PROV .... %CHANGE
Calgary AB 380.3
Edmonton AB 311.4
Windsor ON 217.9
Victoria BC 178.5
Vancouver BC 171.1
Abbotsford–Mission BC 167.7
Kitchener ON 150.5
Hamilton ON 129.5
St. Catharines–Niagara ON 125.9
London ON 123.2
Saskatoon SK 121.5
Greater Sudbury ON 114.0
Toronto ON 112.6
Oshawa ON 109.6
Regina SK 83.3
Winnipeg MB 77.3
Sherbrooke QC 70.8
Ottawa–Gatineau, Ottawa part ON 66.1
Thunder Bay ON 60.0
Kingston ON 58.0
Montréal QC 53.8
Halifax NS 53.3
Saint John NB 52.8
Ottawa–Gatineau, Gatineau part QC 43.7
Québec QC 42.7
St. John's NL 39.4
Trois-Rivières QC 22.6
Saguenay QC 9.4

When comparing apples to apples, it looks like the PG % increase over the year is relatively low.

I am sure some of you are noticing that the povince without a PST is at the top and that the provinces with an HST are all at the bottom. I include Quebec in that since they have a system similar to HST in place. |^|^|^|

Remember those numbers are just the change in the last year. Obviously if you were high to begin with, there wasn't much room to get worse. And if you were low to begin with, like Calgary and Edmonton, there was lots of room to grow.

To me, these numbers are just an indicator that PG has been worse off for longer, and the other parts of the country just joined in our misery recently. Certainly not a good thing.

The numbers of EI collectors as a percentage of total population is the most important EI-related stat, in my opinion.

I am sure some of you are noticing that the povince without a PST is at the top and that the provinces with an HST are all at the bottom. I include Quebec in that since they have a system similar to HST in place. |^|^|^|
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Nice try, but if you take a closer look you'll notice the ones that are higher are resource based communities. The HST has been around for a few years and yet provinces without it had a labour shortage until the recession hit.

67% increase over June 2008. Now if we knew what the unemployed number was for June 2008 we would be able to figure out how many people in Prince George are on EI.

Without that number we have nothing.

Wow, high unemployed figures and we don't even have an NDP government. What's with that?

From a May article in the Province:
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Bob Matters, chairman of the wood council of the United Steelworkers Union, said half of his 20,000 members are either on EI or are working in EI workshare programs.

They work three or four days a week, and get EI benefits for the other one or two days.

Matters said some members who've worked all their lives in forestry have exhausted their EI benefits.

"Some of them have left home, left their communities and left the province," he said.

"A good deal of them, I'm not proud to say, are joining the ranks of welfare."
[url]
http://www.theprovince.com/news/jobless+ranks+swelling/1634144/story.html[/url]
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It is virtually impossible to get a true apple to apple comparison. All I am doing is comparing a June 2008 to June 2009 stat accross the country which uses the same methodology across the country as well as the same criteria for receiving EI and lenght of time to receive it. That is one of the confounding factors which will tend ot make the figures higher this June than last June.

Remember, in March, the government extended the length of time people could receive EI by as much as five weeks and the maximum number to 50 weeks across the country.

So why am I using % increase? Because that is the headline of the article above and it is a figure that is readily available. I agree that it is a useless media release by statscan without other information. The headline has made it worse since it implies that PG is high when it actually is not.
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Here is a report from Kelowna:
http://www.kelowna.com/2009/08/25/unemployment-beneficiaries-increased-by-199-per-cent-this-year
"Statistics Canada released its monthly figures on Employment Insurance beneficiaries today, reporting that 3,740 locals found themselves in need of EI this June.

That number marks a rise of 199 per cent since last June when beneficiary numbers for this city sat at 1,250"

Right on Oldun !

Has anyone counted the unemployed who are not recieving any EI anymore and living off their savings. Waiting for 8 bucks an hour and hopefully 40 hours a week.

"Wow, high unemployed figures and we don't even have an NDP government. What's with that?"

Uh, it's called the Global Economic Crisis, I don't know if you've heard about that. Regardless of who is in power in the province, we don't control the economy of the world.