The federal government released their June 2023 job numbers earlier this month, and I thought I’d go through the data for job tenure.
Job tenure measures the number of consecutive months a person has worked for their current (or most recent) employer.
Here is how all the provinces fared last month for job tenure.
| NB | 109.6 |
| NL | 108.1 |
| SK | 106.7 |
| ON | 102.2 |
| NS | 101.0 |
| PEI | 100.8 |
| MB | 100.7 |
| QC | 100.2 |
| BC | 96.8 |
| AB | 94.6 |
This shows that the average worker in Alberta had worked 94.6 consecutive months at their current (or previous) employer, the shortest length of all the provinces.
The next lowest was British Columbia, where workers stayed at their jobs for a little more than 2 months longer Alberta workers.
New Brunswick workers had the longest tenure, having been at their job for nearly 110 months, 15 months longer than their counterparts in Alberta.
Let’s compare these numbers to a year ago.
| Jun 2022 | Jun 2023 | Change | |
|---|---|---|---|
| NB | 105.2 | 109.6 | 4.4 |
| AB | 91.9 | 94.6 | 2.7 |
| BC | 94.3 | 96.8 | 2.5 |
| PEI | 99.3 | 100.8 | 1.5 |
| ON | 101.0 | 102.2 | 1.2 |
| NS | 102.1 | 101.0 | -1.1 |
| NL | 109.3 | 108.1 | -1.2 |
| SK | 108.6 | 106.7 | -1.9 |
| QC | 103.0 | 100.2 | -2.8 |
| MB | 104.7 | 100.7 | -4.0 |
Here, we can see that Alberta workers had the lowest average tenure last year as well. On the plus side, however, we also saw the second largest increase in job tenure over the last 12 months, behind only New Brunswick.
Meanwhile, half of the provinces saw their job tenure numbers drop, with the average worker in Manitoba working at their current employer for 4 months less than they did a year ago.
Now, let’s look at what things looked like 4 years ago, just two months after the UCP government got into office.
| Jun 2019 | Jun 2023 | Change | |
|---|---|---|---|
| BC | 93.2 | 96.8 | 3.6 |
| NB | 107.0 | 109.6 | 2.6 |
| AB | 92.8 | 94.6 | 1.8 |
| ON | 101.5 | 102.2 | 0.7 |
| NL | 108.1 | 108.1 | 0.0 |
| PEI | 101.7 | 100.8 | -0.9 |
| QC | 102.5 | 100.2 | -2.3 |
| SK | 111.0 | 106.7 | -4.3 |
| NS | 105.4 | 101.0 | -4.4 |
| MB | 105.7 | 100.7 | -5.0 |
It seems as though Alberta had the lowest job tenure back then, too, but this time, they were less than a month behind BC, which had the second lowest job tenure.
Also, Alberta drops to third place, as far as change in job tenure length.
But this isn’t just a UCP problem. Check out what tenure looked like for all the provinces over the last decade.
That thick yellow line is Alberta, and as we can clearly see, over the last decade, Alberta workers have had shorter average tenures than their fellow workers in other parts of the country.
And it didn’t matter whether the PCs were in charge, or whether it was the NDP or UCP.
However, if we look closely at the last and second-to-last place, we see some interesting developments under all 3 parties.
Let’s isolate those two lines though and go back 20 years instead of 10.
The light blue segment is during the PC administration, the orange was while the NDP were in power, and the dark blue is for the current government.
What sticks out with this information is that during the final 12 years of the PC dynasty, job tenure was slowly rising in Alberta.
In comparison, while the NDP were in power, job tenure dropped drastically, from being 13.4 months behind BC in April 2015 to being just 1.6 months behind in April 2019.
All that catching up that Alberta saw under the NDP, however, came to an abrupt halt once the UCP got into power, pretty much plateauing over the last 4 years.
In fact, over the last 4 years, Alberta saw a monthly average of 1.7 months behind BC, which is barely more than the 1.6 the NDP finished their term with.
