Future of work
A curated resource of recent research on trends shaping Canada's labour market.
The volume of summer job postings is down 22% year-over-year, led by a decrease in postings for typically seasonal roles, such as camp counsellor, lifeguard, and camp manager.
This aligns with trends from the past year that have demonstrated struggles in youth employment (see our article from last summer about the state of youth employment in Canada). Further, this news about summer job postings provides evidence that the trend can be expected to persist in the short term.
The decline is not exclusive to summer and seasonal jobs. Federal public service job cuts have disproportionately affected people in their twenties. Nor are hardships within Canada’s labour market unique to youth: data have shown that the employment rate has trailed behind the rates of previous years and that job creation has not kept pace with population growth.
Recent economic trends—such as tariffs levied by the United States, the rising prevalence of AI, persistent inflation and high interest rates ,—are exacerbating the situation.