BC
2.0
Months later, it's still an eye-popping number. After B.C. went
into lockdown to contain the COVID-19 pandemic, the province lost 400,000 jobs in March
and April. Anyone else miss the good old days of the global financial crisis? Our job losses
in the ensuing Great Recession totalled just 70,000 over a nine-month stretch, notes Ken
Peacock, chief economist at the Business Council of British Columbia.
In June, the BCBC forecasted that the provincial gross domestic product will shrivel by 7.8
percent this year, versus 2.6 percent during the 2008-09 downturn. As B.C. keeps reopening
everything from hair salons to movie sets, Peacock expects a surge in job gains this summer.
"We're not going to get all of those 400,000 back, though, or anything close," he warns.
b y N a t h a n C a d d e l l , A l y s s a H i r o s e a n d N i c k R o c k e l
OUR PROVINCE WILL NEVER BE THE SAME AF TER COVID-19.
THAT ISN'T NECESSARILY A BAD THING
APRIL 2020 JULY/AUGUST 2020 BCBUSINESS 23
