Payroll employment decreased in five sectors in July, including construction. (Source: Statistics Canada, Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours (2612), table 14-10-0220-01.)
While Canadian employment nudged into the positive column in July, the construction sector hit a second straight month of declines, according to the latest Statistics Canada report on the number of employees receiving pay and benefits from their employer. Payroll employment in the Survey of Employment, Payrolls and Hours increased by 21,600, or 0.1 per cent in July, following a decline of 9,100 jobs in June.
Payroll employment in Canada’s construction sector dropped by 2,200 positions in July. That 0.2 per cent dip came on the heels of a 0.3 per cent drop in June, when the sector contracted by 3,700 positions. Compared with the sector’s recent peak posted in December of 2024, payroll employment in construction was down by 13,700 positions, or slightly more than one per cent. The decline over this period was driven by specialty trade contractors, which were down 7,000 workers, residential building construction, which fell by 5,500, and building equipment contractors, which were off by 2,800 positions.
Year over year, payroll employment in the construction sector was down by 3,000 in July.
Across all sectors in the report, job vacancies in Canada decreased by 20,600 positions. This reduction of 4.2 per cent left 469,900 available positions in July. On a year-over-year basis, job vacancies were down by 79,400, or almost 15 per cent, since July of 2024.
Looking at job vacancies in the construction sector, there were 5,600 fewer open positions in July than in June. This 14.3 per cent drop brought the sector’s vacancy tally to 33,800 for the month. Compared to one year earlier, the number of vacancies in the sector was down by 11,200 positions, or 25 per cent in July. And compared to the most recent peak of 89,000 available positions posted in April of 2022, vacancies were down 62 per cent in July, a drop of 55,200 positions.
That was a factor in July posting the lowest job vacancy rate in construction since October of 2017, decreasing by 0.4 percentage points to 2.8 per cent. The job vacancy rate was down 0.9 percentage points from July of 2024.
