BC Unemployment Rate at Decade High

March’s unemployment rate rose to 6.7 percent in British Columbia, which saw 19,000 jobs lost across several industries.

The rate was the province’s highest since February 2016, with the exception of the COVID-19 pandemic years, which saw unemployment spike to 13.4 percent in May 2020.

Job losses were mostly reported in wholesale trade, transportation and warehousing, and finance and insurance, while some gains were seen in manufacturing, natural resources, and certain services sectors, data from Statistics Canada shows.

While the employment rate in the province fell to 60.1 percent in March, the labour force participation rate held steady at 64.4 percent. The participation rate is the proportion of those 15 and older who are employed or actively looking for work.

B.C. youths were hit particularly hard, with unemployment among 15- to 24-year-olds reaching 17.1 percent in March, an increase of 2.7 percentage points over February.

Ravi Kahlon, B.C.’s minister of jobs and economic growth, was optimistic in his outlook, saying that despite overall losses, B.C. was seeing jobs growth in construction, manufacturing, and self-employment.

“B.C.’s economy is showing signs of strength in a number of key sectors, with 3,700 more jobs in manufacturing and 2,800 more jobs in construction,” he said in an April 10 statement. “In addition, self-employment was up by 13,300, which reflects people’s confidence in starting their own businesses.”

“B.C.’s unemployment rate is … in line with the national average, reflecting the broader economic pressures being felt across Canada and around the world from Trump’s tariffs and conflict in the Middle East,” he added.

In its Budget and Fiscal Plan 2026 published on Feb. 17, the province wrote that “B.C. is less exposed to U.S. trade than other provinces, with nearly half of all goods exports going to non-U.S. destinations.”

However, the province’s outlook for international trade remains uncertain as Canada renegotiates the terms of the Canada-United States-Mexico Agreement and works to diversify trade to new foreign and domestic markets, it wrote.

“The Canadian labour market appears to be in a holding pattern, with the underlying trend in employment not strong enough to bring the jobless rate down further,” CIBC Senior Economist Andrew Grantham wrote on April 10.

“Given continued uncertainty over US trade and with energy prices adding to company costs, hiring is likely to remain cautious in the near term and we forecast only a very marginal improvement in the unemployment rate before year-end, before hopefully seeing greater progress in 2027.”