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1993-07-09
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JOBLESS RATE 'NATURAL,' BANK MEMO SAYS
From the Canadian Press
Published in:
Toronto Star, Monday, June 28, 1993
"The number of unemployed is currently reported to be about 1.6
million people. Reducing this by 1 million would take us well
below the natural rate of unemployment and lead to undue
hardships to businesses due to rising wage expectations. Indeed,
since 1982, the reported number of unemployed has never dipped
below the level of 1.0 million." - Daryl Merrett, Bank of Canada
...
Canada is stuck with a "natural" high level of unemployment, a
senior Bank of Canada offical says.
"The number of unemployed is currently reported to be about 1.6
million people," Daryl Merrett said in a January 16 memo to Bank
of Canada Governor, John Crow.
"Reducing this by 1 million would take us well below the natural
rate of unemployment. Indeed, since 1982, the reported number of
unemployed has never dipped below a level of 1.0 million."
The heavily censored memo - dismissing a proposal to boost
emloyment by former Toronto-Dominion bank chief economist and
current Scarborough East Liberal candidate Doug Peters - was
obtained by Canadian Press under the Access to Information Act.
Merrett is a top offical of the central bank's securities
department.
In an article for The Star published in January, Peters called
on the central bank to ease interest rates to encourage job
creation.
Among the benefits of putting 1 million people back to work -
the cost of welfare and unemployment insurance would drop by
$15 billion and tax revenue would jump by $5 to $7 billion, he
wrote.
In an interview yesterday, Peters attacked the notion that
high unemployment is tolerable.
"I don't think there's anything natural about having over 1
million people unemployed," he said.
"Natural rate of unemployment" is a term economists use to
describe a jobless rate that is high enough to hold down wage
demands, thereby keeping inflation in check, and keeping
business profits up and productivity high.
The level for Canada has been variously calculated at between
4 and 6 per cent of the workforce.
But Peters said he and other economists object to the term.
In any case Merrett's analysis is flawed because actual
unemployment is much higher than the figures he quotes in
his memo, Peters said.
Merrett considered only the official unemployment rate, which
doesn't count those who are underemployed, working part time,
or have given up looking for work. In 1982, 9.7 per cent of
the workforce was working part-time. In 1991, this figure
rose to 17.4 per cent and is estimated to rise to as high as
35 per cent by the year 2000 if this trend continues.
"There's at least 600,000 people that have dropped out of the
labor force," he said. "They've just given up looking for jobs
because they couldn't find them."