“To the last, I grapple with thee; From Hell’s heart, I stab at thee;
For hate’s sake, I spit my last breath at thee”
-Herman Melville
Ok, ok, it’s not as dramatic as that but new governments do inherit the economic legacy of its predecessor.
For example, dozens of call centre projects initiated under the McKenna government came to fruition on the Lord goverment.
It would seem that Shawn Graham is getting a similar bounce from all the great economic development under Bernard Lord. From the latest Labour Force Survey*:
*Based on the seasonally adjusted figures.
In the last month, the total # of persons employed dropped and in the last 12 months it increased by 0.1%. Only PEI performed worse. PEI can be forgiven as its job creation since 1999 has been considerably better than that of New Brunswick.
Remember just last week when Jeannot Volpe waxed long and poetic about the great job his government did at creating jobs.
Keep in mind when you look at these numbers, the government ‘created’ something like 20,000 public servant jobs during this timeframe (health care, education, public admin jobs). So, that doesn’t leave much left over for the private sector. And when you back out the 12k or so call centre jobs that have been created since 1999 (the McKenna legacy), there’s not much left at all.
I usually end the monthly labour market blog with a quote from the Minister talking about how great things are or maybe Samuel LeBreton gloating about the strength of the economy or even Al Hogan chastising Nova Scotia for not being as successful as New Brunswick. However, because the survey came out so quick, it must have caught everyone by surprise (it usually only comes out later in the month). So, I’ll save the review of media commentary for another day.