Employment Insurance, December 2023
Released: 2024-02-22
There were 464,000 Canadians receiving regular Employment Insurance (EI) benefits in December, up 6,600 (+1.4%) from November. On a year-over-year basis, the total number of regular EI beneficiaries increased by 60,000 (+14.8%).
Data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS) show that the unemployment rate held steady at 5.8% in December, following increases in six of the previous seven months. From April to November, the unemployment rate rose by 0.7 percentage points.
In general, variations in the number of EI beneficiaries can reflect changes in the circumstances of different groups, including those becoming beneficiaries, those going back to work, those exhausting their regular benefits, and those no longer receiving benefits for other reasons.
Chart 1
The number of regular Employment Insurance beneficiaries rises slightly since July 2023
More core-aged men and women receive regular Employment Insurance benefits
In December, there were 2,700 (+1.5%) more core-aged men receiving regular EI benefits, the fourth consecutive monthly increase. On a year-over-year basis, the number of core-aged men receiving benefits rose by 31,000 (+20.2%).
The number of regular EI recipients also increased among core-aged women in December (+2,400; +2.2%), the second consecutive monthly increase. On a year-over-year basis, there were 15,000 (+15.5%) more core-aged women receiving regular EI benefits.
In December, there were also more men aged 55 years and older (+900; +1.2%) receiving regular benefits, marking the fourth consecutive monthly increase. On a year-over-year basis, the number of older men receiving regular EI benefits increased by 5,500 (+7.6%).
The number of young (aged 15 to 24 years) women and men and the number of women aged 55 years and older receiving regular EI benefits were little changed in December.
The number of regular Employment Insurance recipients up in four provinces, led by Ontario and Alberta
The number of regular EI beneficiaries rose in four provinces in December. Ontario posted the largest proportional increase, followed by Alberta, Manitoba and New Brunswick. The number of regular EI recipients declined in British Columbia, and there was little change in the other provinces.
The increase in the number of EI recipients in Ontario in December (+4,900; +3.6%) was the fourth notable increase in the last five months. There were increases among core-aged men (+2,500; +4.5%), men aged 55 years and older (+1,300; +7.2%) and core-aged women (+1,100; +2.8%). According to the LFS, employment in Ontario decreased in December (-37,000; -0.5%) and the unemployment rate rose 0.2 percentage points to 6.3%. On a year-over-year basis, the number of EI recipients increased by 34,000 (+32.0%) in Ontario, the largest proportional increase among the provinces. Among Ontario's census metropolitan areas (CMAs), Windsor (+2,300; +49.5%) posted the largest increase in the number of EI recipients in December.
The number of regular EI beneficiaries in Alberta rose by 1,500 (+3.1%) in December, the third consecutive monthly increase. The increase was mostly among core-aged women (+1,000; +8.4%), with core-aged men (+500; +2.0%) and men aged 55 years and older (+100; +1.7%) also posting increases. The Edmonton (+600; +3.4%) and Calgary (+400; +2.5%) CMAs both recorded increases in their number of EI recipients in the month.
In December, there were more EI recipients in Manitoba (+200; +1.1%), and this was the smallest of three consecutive monthly increases in the province. In New Brunswick, the increase in December (+200; +1.0%) marked the first month of notable growth since August 2023.
After five months of increases and little change in November, British Columbia was the lone province to post a notable decline in the number of regular EI recipients in December (-500; -1.0%).
Chart 2
Number of regular Employment Insurance recipients rises most notably in Ontario and Alberta in December
Did you know we have a mobile app?
Get timely access to data right at your fingertips by downloading the StatsCAN app, available for free on the App Store and on Google Play.
Sustainable Development Goals
On January 1, 2016, the world officially began implementing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development—the United Nations' transformative plan of action that addresses urgent global challenges over the following 15 years. The plan is based on 17 specific sustainable development goals.
Employment Insurance statistics are an example of how Statistics Canada supports reporting on global sustainable development goals. This release will be used to help measure the following goal:
Note to readers
Availability of data by occupation
Statistics Canada is currently revising the Employment Insurance Statistics (EIS) data to conform to the 2021 National Occupational Classification (NOC) standard. This will result in EIS occupation categories aligning with the 2021 Census of Population and Labour Force Survey (LFS) NOC 2021 categories. The release of revised data is planned for later in 2024. Until then, information on Employment Insurance (EI) beneficiaries by occupation, including tables 14-10-0336-01 and 14-10-0337-01, will not be available.
Concepts and methodology
EI statistics are produced from administrative data sources provided by Service Canada and Employment and Social Development Canada. These statistics may, from time to time, be affected by changes to the Employment Insurance Act or administrative procedures.
EI statistics indicate the number of people who received EI benefits and should not be confused with LFS data, which provide estimates of the total number of unemployed people. There is always a certain proportion of unemployed people who do not qualify for benefits. Some unemployed people have not contributed to the program because they have not worked in the past 12 months or their employment was not insured. Other unemployed people have contributed to the program but do not meet the eligibility criteria, such as workers who left their jobs voluntarily or those who did not accumulate enough hours of work to receive benefits.
All data in this release are seasonally adjusted, unless otherwise specified. To model the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic, values for all series from March 2020 to November 2021 have been treated with a combination of level shifts and outliers to determine a seasonal pattern for seasonal adjustment. For more information on seasonal adjustment, see Seasonally adjusted data – Frequently asked questions.
The number of regular EI beneficiaries for the current month and the previous month is subject to revision.
The number of beneficiaries is all people who received regular EI benefits from December 3 to 9, 2023. This period coincides with the reference week of the LFS.
A census metropolitan area (CMA) and a census agglomeration (CA) are formed by one or more adjacent municipalities centred on a population centre. A CMA must have a total population of at least 100,000. A CA must have a population of at least 10,000. See Standard Geographical Classification 2016 – Definitions for more information.
Next release
Data on EI for January 2024 will be released on March 21.
Products
More information about the concepts and use of Employment Insurance statistics is available in the Guide to Employment Insurance Statistics (73-506-G).
Contact information
For more information, or to enquire about the concepts, methods or data quality of this release, contact us (toll-free 1-800-263-1136; 514-283-8300; infostats@statcan.gc.ca) or Media Relations (statcan.mediahotline-ligneinfomedias.statcan@statcan.gc.ca).
- Date modified: