Waterloo Region is finding itself on a podium it doesn’t want to occupy.
The unemployment rate in Kitchener, Cambridge, and Waterloo held steady at 8.6 per cent in March, based on the latest Labour Force Survey.
This puts the Tri-Cities in second place among the 20 largest census metropolitan areas.
Waterloo Region is only behind London, which has an unemployment rate of 9.1 per cent.
The jobless rate in these three cities is up by 0.6 per cent compared to March 2025.
Screenshot from the March 2026 Labour Force Survey. (Stat Can)
The unemployment figure for Ontario also remained the same at 7.6 per cent. However, it appears that southern Ontario is facing some tough challenges.
“Regions of Southern Ontario continued to experience challenging labour market conditions and elevated unemployment rates, in a context that includes ongoing economic uncertainty related to tariffs on exports to the United States,” Stat Can said. “Among Canada’s 20 largest census metropolitan areas (CMAs), the 5 highest unemployment rates in March were in London (9.1%), Kitchener-Cambridge-Waterloo (8.6%), Windsor (8.5%), Barrie (8.5%) and Toronto (8.1%).”
These cities in southern Ontario are significantly above the national average of 6.7 per cent.
According to the Region of Waterloo website, its major economic sectors include advanced manufacturing, aerospace, automotive, food processing, and tech and digital media.
The automotive industry has been hit hard by U. S. tariffs as they continue to deal with high duties more than a year after President Donald Trump initiated the trade war.
As noted in the Labour Force Survey, manufacturing jobs decreased at a rate of 5.1 per cent between March 2025 and 2026 in Ontario.
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