The bank offers their views on why the numbers weren’t as bad as we thought:

  1. Self-employment drove the weakness (29k drop), which offset a 27k rise in private sector (15k) and public sector (12k) jobs.
  2. The soft headline was driven by youths’ (aged 15-24) falling 28k. As youths do not have the same impact in housing and consumer markets, the implication for the drop in youths’ employment isn’t as bad as it would have been if the losses were in the 25+ age group.
  3. Quebec youths drove most of the softness by showing 18k fewer jobs.
  4. Wages still grew by 4.5%, which is still running at over twice the BoC’s 2% inflation target.

With this in mind the bank doesn’t think that Friday’s report changes anything for the BoC.

I agree that one jobs print shouldn’t change anything, especially looking at the details under the hood. But when we combine Friday’s job report with the recent CPI deceleration and the lower expectations of higher inflation by Canadian businesses seen in the Business Outlook survey, it gives the bank the cover it needs to sound more dovish.