TORONTO (AP) -- Canada lost a more-than-expected 45,000 jobs in July.
Statistics Canada said Friday the unemployment rate remained unchanged at 8.6 percent, an 11-year-high.
The 45,000 job loss figure is well above the previous month's 7,400 retreat.
The U.S.-equivalent based on labor market size would be 450,000 jobs lost. The U.S. labor market is about 10 times the size of Canada's.
Toronto-Dominion Bank economist Craig Alexander said the consensus for July was 15,000.
Alexander said even when the economy starts to grow again you still have some lingering job losses. Canada's central bank predicted economic growth this quarter.
"I think there's no question that economic growth will re-emerge before the end of the year and I think that we are at the late stage of the job losses," Alexander said.
Alexander said Canada's economy typically lags the U.S. by a quarter.
U.S. employers throttled back on layoffs in July, cutting just 247,000 jobs, the fewest in a year, and the unemployment rate dipped to 9.4 percent, its first decline in 15 months.
Since the recession began in Canada in October 2008, the economy has lost 414,000 jobs.
The bulk of the losses have occurred in manufacturing and have been centered in Canada's most populous province of Ontario -- the center of the country's manufacturing sector.
