Employment rates, by province

Albertans continue to enjoy the strongest labour market

• The highest employment rates in the country can be found in the three Prairie provinces and Ontario. Alberta, in particular, has consistently had the highest rate of all the provinces. In 2003, the employment rate in Alberta was at a record high of 69.6%, reflecting an upward trend in job growth that began in the early 1990s.
• Newfoundland and Labrador has consistently ranked as the province with the lowest proportion of its working-age population holding a job. In 2003, its employment rate was 49.6%, 12.8 percentage points below the national average of 62.4%. However, the employment rate in Newfoundland and Labrador has increased by 7.5 percentage points since 1996, a result of healthy employment growth in the province during this period.
• Over the past three decades, the employment rate gap among the provinces has narrowed: in 1976, there were larger disparities among the provinces than in 2003. Most noteworthy is New Brunswick, where the difference between the provincial employment rate and the national average has decreased more than any other province. In 1976, the provincial employment rate was 9.2 percentage points below the national average and by 2003, that gap had decreased to 5.8 percentage points.

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