High Unemployment Reveals Depth of CrisisAs 2021 gets underway, the number of unemployed workers in Canada continues to soar. Official unemployment of workers looking for work and unable to find a job rose to 1,755,800 persons in December 2020. This indicates 636,000 more unemployed workers compared with February 2020. Also 488,000 employed Canadians reported in December they were working less than half their usual weekly hours.
The drop in the workforce participation rate plus the large number of unemployed and underemployed mean a loss of potential social value for the country. The workers not working in the socialized economy are not producing social wealth. The refusal of the ruling elite to organize universal free childcare and early learning for all children is a block to the economy meeting its potential. The refusal of ruling elites to challenge monopoly right and its expropriation of the added-value workers produce drains needed social value from the economy and country that could be used for increased investments in social programs and public services. The refusal to challenge monopoly right to realize (pay for) the social value they consume from educated and healthy workers as social reproduced-value but instead allow the oligarchy to expropriate it as private profit deprives public education, health care and other social programs of the funds they require to meet and guarantee the needs and rights of Canadians.
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The
number of Canadians 15-years old and over in December was 31,297,700.
This number is considered the potential workforce. The actual workforce
was 20,308,800 persons. Of these, 15,188,300 were employed full time,
3,364,700 employed part time and 1,755,800 were unemployed. The
percentage of workers in the actual workforce yet
underutilized either as unemployed or working less than half their
usual hours was 17.1 per cent for December, affecting 3,472,805 workers.