{"id":803787,"date":"2026-07-15T16:12:16","date_gmt":"2026-07-15T16:12:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/803787\/"},"modified":"2026-07-15T16:12:16","modified_gmt":"2026-07-15T16:12:16","slug":"labour-market-slack-ahead-bank-of-canada-holds-rate-at-2-25","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/803787\/","title":{"rendered":"Labour market slack ahead: Bank of Canada holds rate at 2.25%"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The national unemployment rate stood at 6.5% in June and, according to the bank, &#8220;has hovered in a range of 6\u00bd%-7% since the end of 2024.&#8221; The bank added that growth &#8220;resumed in the second quarter, with growth estimated at 2.5%,&#8221; though it cautioned the pickup &#8220;largely reflects the unwinding of temporary factors.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.hcamag.com\/ca\/specialization\/leadership\/canadian-gdp-grows-05-in-april\/580805\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Canada&#8217;s economy<\/a> grew 0.5% in April after a March contraction, a rebound that signalled tightening labour demnd in energy, manufacturing, and construction.<\/p>\n<p>Inflation and economic outlook<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Consumer price index inflation rose to 3.2% in May, driven mainly by higher gasoline prices linked to the war in the Middle East, the Bank of Canada said. Excluding gasoline, inflation was 2.2%, with core measures close to 2%.<\/p>\n<p>The Bank of Canada projected inflation will &#8220;stay elevated in June and then ease gradually in the coming months, returning to around 2% in early 2027,&#8221; noting the forecast depends on oil and gasoline prices. Inflation is expected to average around 2% in 2027 and 2028.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">On growth, the Bank of Canada forecast the economy will expand by 0.7% in 2026, followed by 1.8% growth in both 2027 and 2028, with slack &#8220;gradually absorbed&#8221; as the recovery proceeds \u2014 a timeline suggesting a tighter labour market remains years away.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The national unemployment rate stood at 6.5% in June and, according to the bank, &#8220;has hovered in a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":803788,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[52,49,48,5977,44,2442],"class_list":["post-803787","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-canada","tag-bank-of-canada","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-labour-market","tag-news","tag-unemployment-rate"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803787","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=803787"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/803787\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/803788"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=803787"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=803787"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=803787"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}