LMIC research lead Anne-Lore Fraikin discussed measuring labour and skills shortages using online job posting data in Canada.

1. Measuring labour and skills
shortages using online job
posting data in Canada
2022.12.03
Anne-Lore Fraikin
Kashyap Arora
Sukriti Trehan

2. 2
Online job postings (ojps) are a promising source of
labour market information
• Increasing concerns about labour shortages in Canada, 1M job vacancies and important
labour shortages in health, accommodation and food services, sales sectors disrupting
economic activity.
• For efficient matching of workers to jobs, workers need information on where job
opportunities are emerging.
• Vacancies measure the unmet demand for labour.
• Vacancies / unemployed workers = a measure of labour shortages.
• In Canada, vacancy data from JVWS provides reliable information but there are certain
limitations.
• Online job postings (ojp) can complement vacancy data to measure real time unmet
demand for labour and labour/skills shortages.

3. 3
The Job Vacancy and Wage Survey (JVWS) provides
reliable information on vacancies but …
• Firm level survey collected by Statistics Canada
• Introduced in February 2015
• Quarterly release but monthly data available since Oct. 2020 (by sector for all of Canada or by PT)
• Stock data
• Target: all business locations operating in Canada that have > 1 paid employee
• Uses the Business Register to generate a sample of about 100,000 businesses
Business Register: a central statistical register of approximately 900,000 businesses and institutions across Canada
• Excluded employers: Religious organizations, private households, international and extra-
territorial public administrations, FPT administrations

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… there are certain limitations in the use of this data
• Quarterly release and time lag: three months time lag before data is published. Cannot
be used to inform real-time policy decisions.
• Sample ( < 10% of total # of employers) makes it impractical to study vacancies at very
detailed local or occupation level because of data suppression for confidentiality reasons.
• Both existing and anticipated job vacancies are collected, but anticipated vacancies
may never materialize.
• Survey : sampling and non-sampling errors.
• FPT administration jobs are not included: ~ 5% of employment in Canada and
includes a considerable number of management occupations.

5. 5
Vicinity jobs is an online job posting data source available
since January 2018
• Big Data analytics and Internet search technologies Canadian company.
• Uses Natural language processing techniques to collect daily information on new online job
postings from hundreds of French and English websites across Canada.
• Available since January 2018.
• Approx. 200,000 new unique job postings per month.
• Flow
• Uses deduplication methods for postings that appear on several websites (an estimated 95% of
duplicated ojps are removed).
• Occupation (85%), industry (50%), geographical location (95%), skills/education required, job
type and duration, data source, experience required, language, etc.

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Three advantages of using online job postings as proxy for
vacancies …
Timeliness
Data are near real time
Localness
Observations are available for
small geographies
Granularity
Employer information,
potential to track user
information, offered wages,
required education and
certifications, skills
requirement

7. 7
… but caution is needed when using ojp data as a proxy
for unmet labour demand
• Ojps and vacancies refer to distinct concepts
→ Not all vacancies are posted online
→ Each ojp might not represent a current vacancy
→ Each ojp may entail one or more vacancies
• Natural language processing (NLP) algorithm and methods are closed to public scrutiny.
• Deduplication of ojp on different websites might not be perfect (95% of duplicates are removed = 5% of
observations are double counted).
• Not all ojp can be captured because certain websites use technology to prevent third-party monitoring (for
ex. LinkedIn).
• Not all ojp can be matched to an occupation, an industry or a location.
→ Ojps are biased towards certain occupations, sectors, jobs and locations.

8. 8
On average, ojp (Vicinity) are 46,000 higher than number of
vacancies (JVWS)
Note: JVWS not seasonally adjusted, discontinued in Q2 and Q3 of 2020
Potential sources of
differences
• Flow vs. Stock
• Time lag
• Conceptual differences
• Deduplication
• Public admin jobs not
included in JVWS
• Not all ojps can be
captured
• …

9. 9
But this average hides very different situations before after
the start of the pandemic
2018 Q1 – 2020 Q1
On average, ojp are 124% of vac
Or Average difference 127,000
2020 Q4 – 2022 Q2
On average, ojp are 93% of vac
Or Average difference -58,000
Reversal of trend
• Change in methodology
(deduplication, data sources,
etc.), ojps and vacancies
are closer
• Change in employer
behavior (more posted
online) ?
• Change in employment
composition ?
• During the pandemic,
people were laid off
temporily, creating
vacancies but they were
hired again after the
pandemic without need
for ojp

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What if we decompose ojps and vacs by province?

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Most provinces (except PEI) display the same trend …

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… but the average ratios are very different between provinces
On average, ojp and vacancies were the closest in ON, BC and QC and the
furthest in NS, PEI and SK

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Ojp slightly underrepresents vacancies in Ontario, Québec
and BC

14. 14
What if we looked at trends rather than level?
Potential sources of
differences
• Flow vs. Stock
• Time lag
• Anticipative vacancies in
JVWS

15. 15
How can we use online job posting data as a measure for labour
shortages?
Ex : Prediction of vacancies for M12 2022 in ON is
ojp M11 ON 2022 * general trend * avg ( Q4 ojp / Q4 vac)
Latest ojp
prediction, adjusted
at each new JVWS release
LT trend,
ojps = 𝛽 months + 𝛽 Xi
Adjustment of ojp to
vac representing bias of ojp
+ seasonality component +
correction for flow/stock
Break down by provinces/geographical location, occupation code (when
quality is improved)
Add adjustment factor for any other relevant X
Reassess the model each month

16. 16
On top of a proxy for vacancies, online job posting data
sources offer other opportunities for analysis
Example: Top 10 skills in Canada in October 2002
Skills
Number of ojp
requiring skill
% of ojp
Teamwork 122497 42.6%
Communication skills 105312 36.6%
Customer service 93958 32.7%
Flexibility 62209 21.6%
Leadership 59174 20.6%
Organizational skills 53371 18.6%
Fast-paced Setting 51681 18.0%
Attention to detail 50491 17.5%
Interpersonal skills 47093 16.4%
Decision-Making 39104 13.6%
Other options:
Top 10 skills by province
Top 10 skills by NOC
Top 10 skills by province and NOC
Top 10 skills with highest yoy growth rate
Bottom 10 skills
Measure of skills shortages
A skills shortage occurs when a sufficient number of candidates are available for a job but not hired because the
employer believes they lack required skills (like occupation-specific technical skills).

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The way forward
1. How to assess the representativity of ojp ?
2. How to use online job postings to measure labour
shortages ?