Canadians Receiving Regular Employment Insurance Benefits Increase in May

On Thursday, Statistics Canada (StatCan) reported that 464,000 Canadians received regular Employment Insurance (EI) benefits in May. This is up 1.9%, or 8,700, from April. Prior to the increase, the number of regular EI recipients had held relatively steady since September 2023.

Year-over-year, the number of regular EI beneficiaries was up 14.0%, or by 57,000 recipients.

Data from the Labor Force Survey show that employment was little changed in May, and the unemployment rate rose 0.1 percentage points to 6.2%. Compared with 12 months earlier, the unemployment rate was up by 0.9 percentage points.

Variations in the number of EI beneficiaries can reflect changes in the circumstances of different groups, including those becoming beneficiaries, those going back to work, those exhausting their regular benefits, and those no longer receiving benefits for other reasons, StatCan noted.