The Northern Ontario Heritage Fund Corporation (NOHFC) is a Crown corporation and development agency of the Ministry of Northern Development and Mines in the Canadian province of Ontario , whose purpose is to provide funding and program support to foster economic development in the economically disadvantaged Northern Ontario region.
54-527: The NOHFC concentrates on six key funding programs: job creation , technology research and development, infrastructure and community development , youth entrepreneurship , youth internship and cooperative education , and generation and conservation of renewable energy. First announced in the David Peterson government's 1987 throne speech, the NOHFC's creation was included in the 1988 provincial budget, and
108-451: A better match. That is, in fact, beneficial to the economy since it results in a better allocation of resources. However, if the search takes too long and mismatches are too frequent, the economy suffers since some work will not get done. Therefore, governments will seek ways to reduce unnecessary frictional unemployment by multiple means including providing education, advice, training, and assistance such as daycare centers . The frictions in
162-536: A job are set above the market-clearing level, causing the number of job-seekers to exceed the number of vacancies. On the other hand, most economists argue that as wages fall below a livable wage, many choose to drop out of the labour market and no longer seek employment. That is especially true in countries in which low-income families are supported through public welfare systems. In such cases, wages would have to be high enough to motivate people to choose employment over what they receive through public welfare. Wages below
216-554: A livable wage are likely to result in lower labor market participation in the above-stated scenario. In addition, consumption of goods and services is the primary driver of increased demand for labor . Higher wages lead to workers having more income available to consume goods and services. Therefore, higher wages increase general consumption and as a result demand for labor increases and unemployment decreases. Many economists have argued that unemployment increases with increased governmental regulation. For example, minimum wage laws raise
270-512: A mismatch can result between the characteristics of supply and demand. Such a mismatch can be related to skills, payment, work-time, location, seasonal industries, attitude, taste, and a multitude of other factors. New entrants (such as graduating students) and re-entrants (such as former homemakers) can also suffer a spell of frictional unemployment. Workers and employers accept a certain level of imperfection, risk or compromise, but usually not right away. They will invest some time and effort to find
324-516: A monthly, quarterly, and yearly basis by the National Agency of Statistics. Organisations like the OECD report statistics for all of its member states. Certain countries provide unemployment compensation for a certain period of time for unemployed citizens who are registered as unemployed at the government employment agency . Furthermore, pension receivables or claims could depend on the registration at
378-579: A new gold mine in Wawa , a $ 900 thousand loan to Brinkman and Associates, a tree-planting firm, and a $ 5 million loan to Bombardier Transportation to expand the company's facility in Thunder Bay . In 1995, the Auditor General of Ontario 's annual report criticized the NOHFC for not having sufficient monitoring programs in place to ensure that its investments were actually achieving their job creation goals. In
432-712: A poor guide to what unemployment rate coincides with "full employment". Structural unemployment occurs when a labour market is unable to provide jobs for everyone who wants one because there is a mismatch between the skills of the unemployed workers and the skills needed for the available jobs. Structural unemployment is hard to separate empirically from frictional unemployment except that it lasts longer. As with frictional unemployment, simple demand-side stimulus will not work to abolish this type of unemployment easily. Structural unemployment may also be encouraged to rise by persistent cyclical unemployment: if an economy suffers from longlasting low aggregate demand, it means that many of
486-498: A region outside the traditional boundaries of Northern Ontario. This decision was made by then-finance minister Ernie Eves , who was the MPP for Parry Sound—Muskoka at the time, and was later reversed by Greg Sorbara in the 2004 provincial budget. Job creation Heterodox Unemployment , according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development), is people above
540-400: A specified age (usually 15) not being in paid employment or self-employment but currently available for work during the reference period . Unemployment is measured by the unemployment rate, which is the number of people who are unemployed as a percentage of the labour force (the total number of people employed added to those unemployed). Unemployment can have many sources, such as
594-509: A vote-buying slush fund . In 1990, the NOHFC gave a $ 5 million grant to the Algoma Central Railway , which opposition Progressive Conservative leader Mike Harris alleged was a "down payment" on a secret deal to have the provincial government take over ownership and operation of the troubled company. Other investments in the early 1990s included a $ 1 million loan to Muscocho Explorations and McNellen Resources to fund construction of
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#1732852242447648-476: Is defined by Eurostat, according to the guidelines of the International Labour Organization, as: The labour force, or workforce, includes both employed (employees and self-employed) and unemployed people but not the economically inactive, such as pre-school children, school children, students and pensioners. The unemployment rate of an individual country is usually calculated and reported on
702-614: Is defined in European Union statistics as unemployment lasting for longer than one year (while unemployment lasting over two years is defined as very long-term unemployment ). The United States Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), which reports current long-term unemployment rate at 1.9 percent, defines this as unemployment lasting 27 weeks or longer. Long-term unemployment is a component of structural unemployment , which results in long-term unemployment existing in every social group, industry, occupation, and all levels of education. In 2015
756-431: Is not enough aggregate demand in the economy to provide jobs for everyone who wants to work. Demand for most goods and services falls, less production is needed and consequently, fewer workers are needed, wages are sticky and do not fall to meet the equilibrium level, and unemployment results. Its name is derived from the frequent ups and downs in the business cycle , but unemployment can also be persistent, such as during
810-433: Is possible to abolish cyclical unemployment by increasing the aggregate demand for products and workers. However, the economy eventually hits an " inflation barrier" that is imposed by the four other kinds of unemployment to the extent that they exist. Historical experience suggests that low unemployment affects inflation in the short term but not the long term. In the long term, the velocity of money supply measures such as
864-581: Is pressure for neither rising inflation rates nor falling inflation rates. An alternative technical term for that rate is the NAIRU , the Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment . Whatever its name, demand theory holds that if the unemployment rate gets "too low", inflation will accelerate in the absence of wage and price controls (incomes policies). One of the major problems with the NAIRU theory
918-409: Is profitable within the global capitalist system because unemployment lowers wages which are costs from the perspective of the owners. From this perspective low wages benefit the system by reducing economic rents . Yet, it does not benefit workers; according to Karl Marx, the workers (proletariat) work to benefit the bourgeoisie through their production of capital. Capitalist systems unfairly manipulate
972-519: Is that no one knows exactly what the NAIRU is, and it clearly changes over time. The margin of error can be quite high relative to the actual unemployment rate, making it hard to use the NAIRU in policy-making. Another, normative, definition of full employment might be called the ideal unemployment rate. It would exclude all types of unemployment that represent forms of inefficiency. This type of "full employment" unemployment would correspond to only frictional unemployment (excluding that part encouraging
1026-437: Is the unemployment of potential workers that are not reflected in official unemployment statistics because of how the statistics are collected. In many countries, only those who have no work but are actively looking for work and/or qualifying for social security benefits are counted as unemployed. Those who have given up looking for work and sometimes those who are on government "retraining" programs are not officially counted among
1080-573: The Great Depression . With cyclical unemployment, the number of unemployed workers exceeds the number of job vacancies and so even if all open jobs were filled, some workers would still remain unemployed. Some associate cyclical unemployment with frictional unemployment because the factors that cause the friction are partially caused by cyclical variables. For example, a surprise decrease in the money supply may suddenly inhibit aggregate demand and thus inhibit labor demand . Keynesian economists, on
1134-498: The McJobs management strategy) and so would be very low. However, it would be impossible to attain this full-employment target using only demand-side Keynesian stimulus without getting below the NAIRU and causing accelerating inflation (absent incomes policies). Training programs aimed at fighting structural unemployment would help here. To the extent that hidden unemployment exists, it implies that official unemployment statistics provide
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#17328522424471188-934: The United States ) or through registered unemployed citizens (as in some European countries), statistical figures such as the employment-to-population ratio might be more suitable for evaluating the status of the workforce and the economy if they were based on people who are registered, for example, as taxpayers . The state of being without any work yet looking for work is called unemployment. Economists distinguish between various overlapping types of and theories of unemployment, including cyclical or Keynesian unemployment , frictional unemployment , structural unemployment and classical unemployment definition. Some additional types of unemployment that are occasionally mentioned are seasonal unemployment, hardcore unemployment, and hidden unemployment. Though there have been several definitions of "voluntary" and " involuntary unemployment " in
1242-421: The capital accumulation (investment) phase of economic growth can continue. According to Karl Marx , unemployment is inherent within the unstable capitalist system and periodic crises of mass unemployment are to be expected. He theorized that unemployment was inevitable and even a necessary part of the capitalist system, with recovery and regrowth also part of the process. The function of the proletariat within
1296-502: The labour market are sometimes illustrated graphically with a Beveridge curve , a downward-sloping, convex curve that shows a correlation between the unemployment rate on one axis and the vacancy rate on the other. Changes in the supply of or demand for labour cause movements along the curve. An increase or decrease in labour market frictions will shift the curve outwards or inwards. Official statistics often underestimate unemployment rates because of hidden, or covered, unemployment. That
1350-656: The 1990s and 2000s, the United States had lower unemployment levels than many countries in the European Union , which had significant internal variation, with countries like the United Kingdom and Denmark outperforming Italy and France . However, large economic events like the Great Depression can lead to similar unemployment rates across the globe. In 2013, the ILO adopted a resolution to introduce new indicators to measure
1404-556: The European Commission published recommendations on how to reduce long-term unemployment. These advised governments to: In 2017–2019 it implemented the Long-Term Unemployment project to research solutions implemented by EU member states and produce a toolkit to guide government action. Progress was evaluated in 2019. It is in the very nature of the capitalist mode of production to overwork some workers while keeping
1458-451: The MZM ("money zero maturity", representing cash and equivalent demand deposits ) velocity is far more predictive of inflation than low unemployment. Some demand theory economists see the inflation barrier as corresponding to the natural rate of unemployment . The "natural" rate of unemployment is defined as the rate of unemployment that exists when the labour market is in equilibrium, and there
1512-487: The United States, for example, the unemployment rate does not take into consideration part-time workers, or those individuals who are not actively looking for employment, due to attending college or having tried to find a job and given up. According to the OECD, Eurostat, and the US Bureau of Labor Statistics the unemployment rate is the number of unemployed people as a percentage of the labour force. "An unemployed person
1566-430: The capitalist system is to provide a " reserve army of labour " that creates downward pressure on wages. This is accomplished by dividing the proletariat into surplus labour (employees) and under-employment (unemployed). This reserve army of labour fight among themselves for scarce jobs at lower and lower wages. At first glance, unemployment seems inefficient since unemployed workers do not increase profits, but unemployment
1620-614: The cost of some low-skill laborers above market equilibrium, resulting in increased unemployment as people who wish to work at the going rate cannot (as the new and higher enforced wage is now greater than the value of their labour). Laws restricting layoffs may make businesses less likely to hire in the first place, as hiring becomes more risky. However, that argument overly simplifies the relationship between wage rates and unemployment by ignoring numerous factors that contribute to unemployment. Some, such as Murray Rothbard , suggest that even social taboos can prevent wages from falling to
1674-476: The creation of its F. Jean MacLeod Butterfly Gallery. In the early 2000s, the NOHFC invested $ 16 million in the creation of a fibre-optic network to improve the region's internet and telecommunications services, and made a $ 3.5 million grant toward the construction of Sudbury's Dynamic Earth . In this era, the NOHFC began to receive criticism for expanding its service area to include the Muskoka District ,
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1728-412: The demand side must grow sufficiently quickly to absorb not only the growing labour force but also the workers who are made redundant by the increased labour productivity. Seasonal unemployment may be seen as a kind of structural unemployment since it is linked to certain kinds of jobs (construction and migratory farm work). The most-cited official unemployment measures erase this kind of unemployment from
1782-460: The differences remain despite national statistical agencies increasingly adopting the definition of unemployment of the International Labour Organization. To facilitate international comparisons, some organizations, such as the OECD , Eurostat , and International Labor Comparisons Program , adjust data on unemployment for comparability across countries. Though many people care about the number of unemployed individuals, economists typically focus on
1836-679: The economics literature, a simple distinction is often applied. Voluntary unemployment is attributed to the individual's decisions, but involuntary unemployment exists because of the socio-economic environment (including the market structure, government intervention, and the level of aggregate demand) in which individuals operate. In these terms, much or most of frictional unemployment is voluntary since it reflects individual search behavior. Voluntary unemployment includes workers who reject low-wage jobs, but involuntary unemployment includes workers fired because of an economic crisis, industrial decline , company bankruptcy, or organizational restructuring. On
1890-734: The effects of unemployment within the economic system. Some of the main types of unemployment include structural unemployment , frictional unemployment , cyclical unemployment , involuntary unemployment and classical unemployment. Structural unemployment focuses on foundational problems in the economy and inefficiencies inherent in labor markets, including a mismatch between the supply and demand of laborers with necessary skill sets. Structural arguments emphasize causes and solutions related to disruptive technologies and globalization . Discussions of frictional unemployment focus on voluntary decisions to work based on individuals' valuation of their own work and how that compares to current wage rates added to
1944-477: The effort to be in contact with an employer, have job interviews, contact job placement agencies, send out resumes, submit applications, respond to advertisements, or some other means of active job searching within the prior four weeks. Simply looking at advertisements and not responding will not count as actively seeking job placement. Since not all unemployment may be "open" and counted by government agencies, official statistics on unemployment may not be accurate. In
1998-450: The enabling legislation was given royal assent on June 7, 1988. At the time, it was set up as a short-term program which was slated to conclude in 1999; it has since seen periodic funding expansions and term extensions, and continues to run today, although as of 2020 the NOHFC has still not been officially converted into a permanent program. The organization's first board, consisting of 19 representatives from various cities and towns across
2052-410: The following: Unemployment and the status of the economy can be influenced by a country through, for example, fiscal policy . Furthermore, the monetary authority of a country, such as the central bank , can influence the availability and cost for money through its monetary policy . In addition to theories of unemployment, a few categorisations of unemployment are used for more precisely modelling
2106-577: The government employment agency. In many countries like in Germany , the unemployment rate is based on the number of people who are registered as unemployed. Other countries like the United States use a labour force survey to calculate the unemployment rate. The ILO describes four different methods to calculate the unemployment rate: The primary measure of unemployment, U3, allows for comparisons between countries. Unemployment differs from country to country and across different time periods. For example, in
2160-573: The late 1990s, the NOHFC was a key investor in new projects such as the Northern Ontario Tourism Marketing Partnership, NORCAT and the Northern Academic Health Science Network. The organization also continued to make grants or loans to existing companies or organizations to expand their operations, including grants to Cinéfest to expand its marketing and advertising, and to Science North for
2214-439: The market for labour by perpetuating unemployment which lowers laborers' demands for fair wages. Workers are pitted against one another at the service of increasing profits for owners. As a result of the capitalist mode of production, Marx argued that workers experienced alienation and estrangement through their economic identity. According to Marx, the only way to permanently eliminate unemployment would be to abolish capitalism and
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2268-691: The market-clearing level. In Out of Work: Unemployment and Government in the Twentieth-Century America , economists Richard Vedder and Lowell Gallaway argue that the empirical record of wages rates, productivity, and unemployment in America validates classical unemployment theory. Their data shows a strong correlation between adjusted real wage and unemployment in the United States from 1900 to 1990. However, they maintain that their data does not take into account exogenous events . Cyclical, deficient-demand, or Keynesian unemployment occurs when there
2322-846: The other hand, cyclical unemployment, structural unemployment, and classical unemployment are largely involuntary in nature. However, the existence of structural unemployment may reflect choices made by the unemployed in the past, and classical (natural) unemployment may result from the legislative and economic choices made by labour unions or political parties. The clearest cases of involuntary unemployment are those with fewer job vacancies than unemployed workers even when wages are allowed to adjust and so even if all vacancies were to be filled, some unemployed workers would still remain. That happens with cyclical unemployment, as macroeconomic forces cause microeconomic unemployment, which can boomerang back and exacerbate those macroeconomic forces. Classical, natural, or real-wage unemployment, occurs when real wages for
2376-434: The other hand, see the lack of supply of jobs as potentially resolvable by government intervention. One suggested intervention involves deficit spending to boost employment and goods demand. Another intervention involves an expansionary monetary policy to increase the supply of money , which should reduce interest rates , which, in turn, should lead to an increase in non-governmental spending. In demands based theory, it
2430-653: The region, was named in July 1988. One of the NOHFC's first large-scale investments was a $ 7.6 million contribution to the creation and construction of the Sudbury Neutrino Observatory . In its earliest years, the NOHFC received some criticism focusing on allegations that it was too often used as an emergency bailout fund for failing natural resource companies rather than as a mechanism to actively encourage economic development or diversification, and that it lacked sufficient controls to prevent it from becoming misused as
2484-447: The replacement of workers by machines might be counted as structural unemployment. Alternatively, technological unemployment might refer to the way in which steady increases in labour productivity mean that fewer workers are needed to produce the same level of output every year. The fact that aggregate demand can be raised to deal with the problem suggests that the problem is instead one of cyclical unemployment. As indicated by Okun's law ,
2538-478: The rest as a reserve army of unemployed paupers. Marxists share the Keynesian viewpoint of the relationship between economic demand and employment, but with the caveat that the market system's propensity to slash wages and reduce labor participation on an enterprise level causes a requisite decrease in aggregate demand in the economy as a whole, causing crises of unemployment and periods of low economic activity before
2592-462: The statistics using "seasonal adjustment" techniques. That results in substantial and permanent structural unemployment. Frictional unemployment is the time period between jobs in which a worker searches for or transitions from one job to another. It is sometimes called search unemployment and can be voluntary, based on the circumstances of the unemployed individual. Frictional unemployment exists because both jobs and workers are heterogeneous , and
2646-429: The system of forced competition for wages and then shift to a socialist or communist economic system. For contemporary Marxists, the existence of persistent unemployment is proof of the inability of capitalism to ensure full employment. There are also different ways national statistical agencies measure unemployment. The differences may limit the validity of international comparisons of unemployment data. To some degree,
2700-459: The time and effort required to find a job. Causes and solutions for frictional unemployment often address job entry threshold and wage rates. According to the UN's International Labour Organization (ILO), there were 172 million people worldwide (or 5% of the reported global workforce) without work in 2018. Because of the difficulty in measuring the unemployment rate by, for example, using surveys (as in
2754-591: The unemployed become disheartened, and their skills (including job-searching skills) become "rusty" and obsolete. Problems with debt may lead to homelessness and a fall into the vicious cycle of poverty, which means that people affected in this way may not fit the job vacancies that are created when the economy recovers. The implication is that sustained high demand may lower structural unemployment. This theory of persistence in structural unemployment has been referred to as an example of path dependence or " hysteresis ". Much technological unemployment , caused by
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#17328522424472808-568: The unemployed even though they are not employed. The statistic also does not count the " underemployed ", those working fewer hours than they would prefer or in a job that fails to make good use of their capabilities. In addition, those who are of working age but are currently in full-time education are usually not considered unemployed in government statistics. Traditional unemployed native societies who survive by gathering, hunting, herding, and farming in wilderness areas may or may not be counted in unemployment statistics. Long-term unemployment (LTU)
2862-633: The unemployment rate, which corrects for the normal increase in the number of people employed caused by increases in population and increases in the labour force relative to the population. The unemployment rate is expressed as a percentage and calculated as follows: As defined by the International Labour Organization , "unemployed workers" are those who are currently not working but are willing and able to work for pay, currently available to work, and have actively searched for work. Individuals who are actively seeking job placement must make
2916-428: The unemployment rate. Reference period In economics , a base period or reference period is a point in time used as a reference point for comparison with other periods. It is generally used as a benchmark for measuring financial or economic data. Base periods typically provide a point of reference for economic studies, consumer demand, and unemployment benefit claims. In public transport scheduling ,
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