OTTAWA - Prospects for a sustained economic recovery brightened considerably Friday on news Canada created 60,000 full-time jobs last month and fresh evidence the U.S. domestic economy is advancing.
Roughly 21,000 net new jobs were added in Canada last month, pushing the national unemployment rate down to 8.2 per cent from 8.3 per cent.
But the better news was that 60,200 more workers found full-time employment, offset by a loss of 39,000 part-time jobs.
Many of the full-time jobs went to men over 55, a group of workers that fared better than most during the recession and have marketable skills that companies and public employers want as the economy recovers.
The public sector added 45,600 jobs in February, while private employers shed 7,500 jobs. Those numbers reflect continued growth in health care, education and administration as well as a slow recovery in parts of the economy most hurt by the recession - manufacturing, transport and warehousing.
In response to the February report, the loonie jumped to its highest level in 20 months. The dollar - which has been gaining against the American loonie in recent days - soared above 98 cents U.S. on the news.
Finance Minister Jim Flaherty called the jobs news positive, but cautioned against reading too much into one month's data.
"I'm hearing fairly positive news from businesses, small and larger, across Canada but I'm not hearing ecstatic news," he said in Toronto. "I wouldn't put it any stronger than that."
He called it significant that Canada's unemployment rate - now down to 8.2 per cent - is about 1.5 percentage points better than the United States, where the recession was deeper and the recovery has been much slower.
But there was also an encouraging signal in the U.S. where retail sales posted a surprising increase in February despite an unusual number of snowstorms and a decline in auto sales from the Toyota problems.
Economists have been pointing at the revival of the U.S. economy as a necessary condition for a sustained recovery in Canada, particularly in the second half of 2010, when Ottawa's stimulus dollars begin to run out.
With the U.S. domestic sector rebounding, many suspect a jobs recovery won't be far down the road.
"If we get the U.S. economy starting to gather a little momentum, that would feed a lot of the (Canadian) economy that are still suffering," said Douglas Porter, deputy chief economist with BMO Capital Markets.
"So I don't think it's not obvious that the second half of the Canadian economy is going to be weaker than the first half," as many analysts had previously forecast.
The Canadian jobs numbers were seen as solid evidence the economy was on the mend last month, particularly since they follow January's pickup of 43,000 jobs and they continue a trend that began in July.
Since then, Canada has added 159,000 workers, recovering more than a third of the 417,000 jobs lost at the lowest point of the recession.
Economists said the dollar's rise Friday was supported by the fact the underlying data was even stronger than the headline, with gains in manufacturing and natural resources.
And the gain was not regarded as artificial - owing to the Olympics or unseasonably warm weather in February, the report said.
The Olympic effect was noticeable, but it was mild. There was a pickup of 27,000 additional jobs in the accommodation and food services industries, but only 5,700 were in British Columbia. The warm weather would suggest a boost in construction jobs, but that category fell by 11,000.
"The numbers clearly show that Canada is not having a jobless recovery," said TD Bank deputy chief economist Craig Alexander.
Economists are now expecting first-quarter growth to be in the three-to-four per cent range, following the robust five-per-cent pop in the last quarter of 2009.
On Thursday, the Royal Bank upgraded its forecast for the Canadian economy this year to 3.1 per cent growth, and 3.9 per cent for 2011.
If there was a negative aspect to the report, it was that 46,000 public service jobs were created in February. Economists prefer jobs to be created in the private, particularly exporting, sector.
Public sector jobs growth could be unsustainable as the federal and provincial governments focus on spending cuts over the next year or two to pare down their budget deficits.
The goods producing industries, which posted large losses during last year's slump, fared well as troubled manufacturing picked up 17,000 workers, and natural resources rose 11,000.