Another seven-figure sale in Toronto.

Discouraged and tired of rejection, over 53,000 unemployed Canadians stopped looking for work last month. That is what economists called discouraged workers, which means they just vanish from the unemployment stats.

So, the labour force shrank. And of those still in it, 45,000 others lost their jobs. Well, actually a lot more than that were punted, but the creation of other jobs (mostly in the service sector) took up some slack. The unemployment rate is the highest in 11 years, and since October close to a half million net jobs have gone. The lion’s share of those were full-time, in manufacturing and construction.

In fact last month alone 18,000 more construction workers were idled – calling into question bullish news of late about big jumps in housing starts. Since October 120,000 construction jobs have vanished, as have 218,000 manufacturing positions.

That’s about equal to all the jobs that exist in Edmonton or Ottawa.

And how does this compare to the States? Last month the US shed 247,000 workers, which is less on an overall population basis than Canada. Actually, our job loss numbers were twice as scary.

Oh yeah, and our job loss figures would have almost doubled again last month were it not for 35,000 people who became ‘self-employed.’

You may be aware that discouraged, unemployed people can fairly easily become ‘self-employed’ if they have access to a car, a loan and a laptop. Government benefits still flow, even if self-employment income does not.

I mention this to put into some context the issue of consumer spending, consumer credit and the recovery. In Canada the labour force participation rate is now just over 67%, similar to the 65.7% rate in the States. Both countries currently have millions of long-term unemployed.

Snapshot: The city of Stratford in SW Ontario, home of the auto rust belt. Population is about 35,000, and the latest Stats Can report says the area now has 14,200 people out of work. How is this so different from Detroit, or Flint?

But, as you know, Canada has a bustling housing market, rising levels of consumer spending, increases in housing starts, recovering car sales and apparently enough surplus household cash lying around for Ontario and BC to slap a new sales tax on everything (including real estate) starting in a few months.

While the US real estate market declined another 18% in the past year, 20 million families are in negative equity and 19 million homes sits empty, our average national house price has hit a new record. In Toronto’s Leaside last week (30-foot lots, 70-year-old houses, no garages), a home listed at $919,000 went for more than $1.2 million. Mortgage lending has exploded enough to put Canadians into more debt than ever before. And the orgy continues.

Meanwhile mainline economists point to consumer spending, retail sales and the real estate market as ‘evidence’ we are in (or near) recovery. This one, they say, will be led by household spending, not by corporate profits, commodity prices or business investing. Maybe even led by fools.

Hard to see how all this can happen when in a single month 53,000 people stopped looking for jobs, 45,000 more lost their jobs, and 35,000 made up jobs. Yet even with the official job loss number of just 45,000, we were in economic free fall compared to the States.

I’m just a dumb country boy. Maybe you can explain this.

Sure hope somebody can.