It may seem counterintuitive in an era of government fiscal restraint, but growth in Canada’s public sector is still outpacing private hiring.
That disconnect — given the massive number of federal job losses in recent years — can be attributed mainly to ongoing increases in public payrolls at the municipal level, in particular, and mainly in Ontario.
The federal civil service, on the other hand, has indeed been shrinking.
The Fraser Institute study, which tracked employment trends from 2003 to 2013, found Canada’s public sector grew 22.6% during that time — more than double the increase in private-sector jobs, which accounted for 10.7% of workers.
By 2012, the number of federal civil servants had already fallen to 415,000 from 427,000, he said. In fact, experts estimated the federal share of public-sector employment in Canada is around 11% to 12%
Ontario has about 44% of Canada’s public-sector workers — about 38% to 40% of the population — "so a lot of that increase is driven by Ontario, " according to one expert.
Meanwhile, considering the scope of the Fraser Institute study extends only to 2013, it does not capture the impact of recent downsizing in the federal public sector, which has already lost almost 26,000 jobs.
Another 8,900 positions could be eliminated by 2017.
