Statistics Canada recently released data that reported the number of job vacancies across the country falling to 457,400 in August 2024. This drop represents the lowest point since August of 2017. This marks the second largest year-over-year decrease of any month, at 15.2 percent over February 2020. The agency made this announcement on October 30, 2025, with the initial post timestamped at 11:22 am and the last update at 11:32 am.
While these openings are promising, the job vacancy numbers indicate how difficult the current labor market is, as our unemployment rate continues to climb. This report presents a striking juxtaposition with that reality. In August, for every job opening, there were 3.5 unemployed people. That’s the first time we’ve had a higher unemployment-to-job vacancy ratio than November 2016. Yet this ratio is a misleading measure, as it largely excludes the period between April and September 2020. During the entirety of that period, the COVID-19 pandemic rendered data collection infeasible.
For the rate of job vacancies, it was 3.0 percent in August 2024. This last figure is an additional testament to the tightening labor market conditions, with fewer jobs left to fill. The August data is representative of bigger trends and difficulties that employers and job seekers are experiencing across the country.
While the drop in job vacancies is certainly important, what is more telling is the context of what some previous data already indicated. The months of April through September 2020 were deeply disrupted by the pandemic, resulting in data that were not available. A deviation that further complicates basic before and after comparisons, especially during this time period, where outlier events should be factored in like.
As the central government statistics agency, Statistics Canada is the source of critical data needed by policymakers and economists. They rely on this data to assess where the labor market stands today. Often, a rapid decline in job vacancies like this leads to conversations about workforce development strategies and pandemic recovery investments.
