Canada experienced a drastic 15.7% decline in employment since February 2020 as a part of the economic impact of COVID 19 pandemic. This decline has managed to exceed all those seen in downturns in the past. It has even managed to surpass the global economic meltdown in 2008-2009 and previous recessions.

Canada also has been recorded to have lost nearly 2 million jobs in April owing to the consequences of the coronavirus outbreak. There has been a rise in the unemployment rate to 13%, with 1.93 million new unemployed, in the month of April alone.

The government agency Statistics Canada or StatCan, in its Labour Force Survey, provided the statistics. Thereafter, Justin Trudeau, the Prime Minister of Canada, has extended a wage subsidy program. This wage subsidy program has been scheduled to last till the 6^th of June.

“The April unemployment rate would be 17.8% when adjusted to reflect those who were not counted as unemployed for reasons specific to the Covid-19 economic shutdown.”, stated StatCan. 

According to StatCan’s explanation, the overall scenario could have been worse because many people wished to return to work once their industries reopened even after the forced lockdown and hence could not be counted amongst the unemployed. StatCon tries to point at the adverse impact of the COVID 19 pandemic beyond the topline numbers.

“In April, more than one-third (36.7%) of the potential labour force did not work or worked less than half of their usual hours, illustrating the continuing impact of the Covid-19 economic shutdown on the labour market.”, added StatCan.

Many adjustments had been made in the view of the expeditiously spreading coronavirus. These new adjustments were also recorded in the data. Almost 5 million people have now been working from home. This count includes 3.3 million people who originally had been working from a location other than their residences. 

“The actions taken by various levels of government to protect public health amounted to an intentional shutdown of the economy which resulted in a sudden shock to the Canadian labour market.”, stated StatCon.