The Irony of the Economic Downturn

The assembly lines are stopped, plants closed, workers laid off. That seems to be the general theme of the economy in Southwestern Ontario these days.

And yet over the next decade more than 1 million jobs will remain vacant in Ontario.

The twin trends of an aging population and the growing demands for knowledge workers will create a mismatch between workers and jobs, predicts Rick Miner, the past president of Seneca College and a former management professor.

The result will be an expanding pool of unskilled workers looking for jobs and an even larger number of companies that cannot find the workers they require, he says. The labour shortfall could leave more than one million jobs in Ontario alone unfilled in the coming decade, he forecasts.

“Unless we take decisive action, our economic future and social fabric will be in jeopardy,” warned Mr. Miner, who will deliver his grim prognosis in a speech to a Bay Street audience Wednesday.

Governments will need to take a central role in averting this crisis, but to this point it appears that only unemployed workers are heeding the message.

In an environment that is seeing a 14% increase in college enrollment for next year, mature student enrollment is already up 20% and rising.  Add to that an 8% increase in the number of high school students applying for college and quickly you begin to see where the next crunch will come – finding education space in our colleges to train those 1 million skilled workers Dr. Miner refers to.

Ontario is not alone. With a new apprenticeship program that puts the onus on apprentices rather than companies,  BC’s skilled labour shortage has been exacerbated by the upcoming Winter Olympics to the point that over the next four years they expect to be short 30,000 apprentices PER YEAR!

And it doesn’t stop there. A recent Manpower Inc. survey indicates that Canada has one of the most acute labour shortages in the industrialized world, with only Mexico feeling the pinch more than this country. The three countries with the highest rate of employers experiencing the labour shortage crunch were Mexico (78%), Canada (66%) and Japan (58%).

According to Monster.Ca the top ten list of positions they are having the most difficulty finding candidates for is as follows:

• Sales representatives
• Customer Service/Customer support
• Engineers
• Drivers
• Mechanics
• Labourers
• Chefs/cooks
• Electricians
• Skilled trades
• Nurses

These are interesting times, with retirement age rising to 70, an aging population and a national shortage of skilled labour. All this while laid off employees in major manufacturing try to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. And doctors from other countries drive taxis in Toronto.
Sources: The Globe and Mail, The Tyee, Monster.Ca