Vincent警告，央行在结构调整期间刺激需求的能力有限；若以降息推升需求，可能在供给因贸易摩擦或人口老化而下降时，反而加剧通膨并延后必要重组。他指出，长期失业率已升至自2000年以来（不含疫情期间）最高，且过去两年职缺对经验要求更高，而从未工作者占比也在增加，反映技能与经验错配。
青年受冲击最重：15至24岁失业率由2022年的9%低点升至四年后逾14%，青年亦占近四分之一的长期失业者，且其占比自2022年以来已翻倍以上。Vincent认为，2022至2024年的移民激增、如今仍存的技能错配，以及AI对入门职位的自动化风险，都是可能的结构性因素，但他强调AI是否为主要原因仍言之过早。
Bank of Canada Deputy Governor Nicolas Vincent said Canada’s labor market is undergoing structural change, not just a short-term slowdown, making monetary policy harder to calibrate. The country’s “low hire, low fire” environment and unemployment rate, which has hovered between 6.5% and 7% over the past year, suggest aggregate data is masking deeper shifts in labor-market dynamics.
Vincent warned that the central bank has limited ability to offset structural supply weakness caused by trade friction or population aging, and that using rate cuts to stimulate demand could worsen inflation and delay restructuring. He highlighted rising long-term unemployment, now at its highest level in data since 2000 excluding the pandemic, along with a widening mismatch between workers’ skills and employers’ experience requirements.
Young people are bearing the brunt: unemployment for ages 15 to 24 rose from a record low of 9% in 2022 to above 14% four years later, and youth now make up nearly one-quarter of the long-term unemployed, more than double their 2022 share. Vincent pointed to higher immigration from 2022 to 2024, ongoing skills mismatches, and possible AI-driven automation of entry-level jobs as structural factors, though he said it is still too early to judge AI’s role.