B.C. Premier Christy Clark's jobs plan is a bust, according to a new report that points to a troubling plunge in private-sector jobs in 2013.
While B.C. has added jobs since Clark announced her plan in late 2011, most of the gains are due to 20,000 new public-sector jobs, economist and report author Iglika Ivanova said in an interview Wednesday.
But B.C. actually lost close to 4,000 jobs in the first 10 months of 2013. And in Clark's target area of private-sector job creation, 12,000 jobs disappeared through October last year, the last month of available data from Statistics Canada.
Ivanova said her research report for the 91原创 Centre for Policy Alternatives shows B.C. has only lost private-sector jobs outside of a recession one other time, in 2001, over the past 40 years. But in 2001, just 2,700 private-sector jobs were shed.
"I was surprised at the extent of the losses last year," Ivanova said, adding that while job creation was weak across Canada, only B.C. and some Atlantic provinces actually lost jobs.
Clark's plan is not innovative in that it promotes resource extraction, and bets heavily on a "risky" play for liquefied natural gas contracts coming out of Asia, according to Ivanova.
LNG project proponents in B.C. will face heavy competition from the U.S. and Australia, so the boom Clark is forecasting could fizzle, or be short-term at best, Ivanova said. The report also stated the environmental costs of Clark's plan will be too high.
Instead, B.C. should pour more resources into the public sector, especially in early childhood education, and health and transportation to a lesser extent, Ivanova's report said.
That would run counter to the government's current focus on fiscal discipline and attempts to draw foreign investment into the resource sector, and would require new sources of revenue.
Ivanova said that B.C.'s wealthiest workers should pay higher income tax, with proceeds invested in schools and job training that will lead to improved productivity in the future.
"We have the lowest personal income tax rates in the country for people that make over $120,000," she said. "I don't see why we can't change that so that we're only the fourth lowest, or something like that."
The government would not comment on the new report before fully reviewing Ivanova's findings on Thursday, a spokesman said.
The 2013 job picture for B.C. will be complete with new data to be released Friday.
Ivanova said she expects jobs weakness in B.C. to continue, and risks to the economy include consequences when interest rates eventually rise and impact the spending habits of heavily indebted B.C. households.
