Ontario Jobs, Where Are They?

Green, blue, white, gray, service, we don’t care any more. Any job will do.

Where are the jobs that the Liberals campaigned on to win last year’s election? The release of May’s statistics indicated that Ontario lost 18,700 jobs. Ouch!

Where is our government taking us with their job creation policies?It is becoming more and more evident that the Liberal job creation strategy is not working. Furthermore, to make matters worse, Ontario’s jobless rate of 7.8% is considerably higher than the national average of 7.3%. Across Canada in May the economy added 7,700 jobs but here in Ontario we were a loser, again. Hidden in these number is the fact that a majority of growth was in part-time jobs and self-employment. Self-employment is considered a job? Really? No security, tremendous risk, little support, and this is considered a job? Many self-employed individuals have no other options but to try to find some market for their skills so to call self-employment a job is really stretching the definition.

In Ontario job growth has come in the automotive sector as US auto sales increase, but even with this recent job growth in Ontario’s manufacturing sector the employment level is still 1/3 of the 2004 historical high of 1.1 million people.

So, manufacturing in Ontario has lost over 350,000 jobs since 2004. It may be just a coincidence that the current Liberal government came into power just one year before these jobs started to disappear, but we doubt it. We have a government that is run strictly to get re-elected and not to do what is good for the citizens.

If the economic situation in Europe gets worse, or if the US continues with anemic job growth, then hang on to your wallets ladies and gentlemen. The Liberal economic strategy is based almost completely on projected international economic growth, leading to an increase in exports and associated jobs. The possibility of this outcome is looking extremely low right now so, sooner than later, Mr. McGuinty will have both hands in your pockets to pay for his many horrendous mistakes.

Oh, and don’t forget that the Liberals have also promised to balance the budget by 2017! Really, what are the chances of that? Slim and none. Therefore the Liberal plan boils down to passing the fiscal disaster down to the next generation, or two, or three, or……!

When taking into account the Liberal plan to continue increasing our cost of electricity it is reasonable to project that job losses in sectors that use electricity will continue.

Given the decline in our manufacturing sector and the loss of good jobs that come with it, perhaps investing in the resurgence in the manufacturing of the buggy whip is not such a bad idea!