Stats Canada says there are about 1,500 more people in work in the Kootenays than a year ago. But month-on-month stats are worse.
The February data shows there were 4,400 people unemployed – which is a rate of 5.8%.
A year ago about 5,900 were jobless with an unemployment rate of 8.1 %. However the jobless rate in January was 5.2%.
The size of the labour force hasn’t changed much.
The provincial unemployment rate has improved to 6% from 6.6% a year ago. But it was at 5.5% in January.
Canada has an unemployment rate of 6.8% which is down from 7.2% in February 2014 but worse than the previous month when it was at 6.5%.
