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OTTAWA - The economy might be on the rebound, but economists warn 2010 will be a year of slow job growth with the manufacturing sector bringing up the rear.
"In a normal year, on average, we create the better part of 300,000 jobs," said Warren Jestin, chief economist for Scotiabank. "Over the next year, we will probably not exceed more than 200,000, so that's a pretty muted performance."
Since employment peaked in October 2008, Canada has lost about 320,000 jobs - a number that would be much higher without the 80,000 jobs added in November.
The job market is always slow to recover because employers delay firing workers until well into the recession and don't hire them back until well into the recovery.
When the Canadian economy recovers, it is expected to look much different than before the downturn; manufacturing jobs simply won't return to previous levels.
"Canada will continue this evolution away from goods and towards services, particularly high value-added services," said Don Drummond, chief economist for the Toronto-Dominion Bank. "That's the way it has been going for the last couple of years and I think it will accelerate."
According to Statistics Canada, there were 2.249 million manufacturing jobs in 2000. By 2008, that number had fallen to 1.97 million - a loss of about 280,000 jobs.
Meanwhile, the services sector grew to 13.104 million workers in 2008 from 10.942 million in 2000 - a gain of more than two million jobs.
Economists say future job growth in manufacturing will likely come in companies with 50 or fewer employees, and be mostly highly skilled jobs.
"We're going to be seeing the development of a much more specialized type of manufacturing," said Jayson Myers, president of Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters. "It will be more customized, specialized, hi-tech and around that the jobs will be in engineering, design and technology."
Myers said he believes service jobs won't rebound until the manufacturing sector recovers, and that will depend on what happens in the U.S.
"I think it's going to be a long time before we see consumer demand and business investment driving long in the United States," he said.
peter.zimonjic@sunmedia.ca