Employers added some 88,000 positions, dropping the unemployment rate to 6.6 per cent from 6.9 per cent, Statistics Canada reported. The percentage of the working age population with a job rose to 60.7 per cent, the first increase since November. (The Logic)

Talking point: The numbers undermine the contention that Canada is in a “full-blown” recession. The report checked all the boxes that an economist would associate with a healthy labour market: average hourly wages increased at a rate faster than inflation, most of the hiring was for full-time work and the youth unemployment rate plunged almost a full percentage point, to 13.4 per cent. An economist also would offer these caveats: one month doesn’t make a trend, and net hiring still is negative on the year; the youth jobless rate remains unusually high; and an economy dependent on exports to the U.S. will struggle until trade policy becomes less chaotic.