OTTAWA, Sept. 6 -- Canada's unemployment rate rose 0.2 percentage points to 6.6 percent in August, after holding steady in July, Statistics Canada said Friday.

The unemployment rate in August was the highest since May 2017, outside of 2020 and 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, the national statistical agency said, adding that the unemployment rate has generally trended up since April 2023, rising 1.5 percentage points over this period.

There were 1.5 million unemployed people in August, an increase of 60,000, or 4.3 percent, from July, and an increase of 272,000, or 22.9 percent, from a year ago, the agency said.

According to the agency, among those who were unemployed in July, 16.7 percent had transitioned to employment in August, which was lower than the corresponding proportion a year earlier, an indication that unemployed people may be facing greater difficulties finding work.

The summer job market in 2024 was particularly difficult for returning students aged 15 to 24, who were part of the three largest racialized groups.

Among Black returning students, the unemployment rate was 29.5 percent on average from May to August. This represented an increase of 10.1 percentage points compared with the same period of last year.

The unemployment rate was also up in the summer of 2024 among Chinese students who intended to return to school full time in the fall and their South Asian counterparts, Statistics Canada said.

  - Xinhua