In fact, employment growth last year was less than what would be consistent with growth in the economy’s potential.4 You can get a better sense of how important this is when you take a structural approach to measuring the output gap.
In the autumn of 2010, Canadian household debt climbed to an unprecedented level of 147 per cent of disposable income (Chart 7). The relatively healthy financial condition of Canadian households at the beginning of the “Great” Recession helped the Canadian economy to better withstand the initial shocks of the crisis.