Total labour demand edged higher in the first quarter, even as the number of job vacancies continued to shrink, according to new data from Statistics Canada.
The national statistical agency reported that with payroll employment rising by 62,800 in the first quarter, total labour demand — the combination of filled and unfilled jobs — rose by 42,200 through the first three months of the year.
The rise in payrolls offset an ongoing retreat in open jobs, which declined by 20,600 in the first quarter to 524,300. On a year-over-year basis, job vacancies were down by 18.1% in the first quarter — and are now almost back to the pre-pandemic level of just over 500,000.
StatCan also reported that the job vacancy rate — open jobs as a share of total labour demand — came in at 2.9% in the first quarter, down by 0.1 percentage points from the previous quarter and 0.7 points year over year.
Additionally, the ratio of unemployed workers to job vacancies climbed to 2.9 in the first quarter, up from 2.8 in the fourth quarter and 2 in the first quarter of 2024, as both the number of unemployed workers rose and the number of job vacancies declined.
Against this backdrop, wage growth slowed as well.
In the first quarter, average hourly wages rose at a 3.6% annual rate, down from 4.4% in the previous quarter.