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The Canadian economy continues to grow at a solid pace, consistent with the Bank’s outlook in the January Monetary Policy Report Update.

At the time of last November’s Monetary Policy Report, two issues dominated the analysis: the global economic slowdown and the fallout from the September terrorist attacks.

Growth in the Canadian economy has been essentially in line with the expectations set out in the Bank’s January Monetary Policy Report Update.

In the April Monetary Policy Report, the Bank noted that inflation was well above its 2 per cent target and that short-term inflation expectations had edged up.

Growth in the global economy began to slow in the fourth quarter of 2007 and the first quarter of 2008. This reflected the effects of the slowdown in the U.S. economy and ongoing dislocations in global financial markets.

At the time of the November 2000 Monetary Policy Report, although signs of the anticipated slowing of the U.S. economy were becoming apparent, the momentum of the global economy was considered strong.

This is the second in a series of semi-annual reports designed to increase the transparency and understanding of Canadian monetary policy.

We estimate the effects of economic uncertainty on time use and discuss its macroeconomic implications. We develop a model to demonstrate that substitution between market and non-market work provides an additional insurance margin to households, weakening precautionary savings and labour supply and lowering aggregate demand, ultimately amplifying the contractionary effects of uncertainty.

In Canada, temporary workers account for 14 per cent of jobs in the non-farm business sector, are present in a range of industries, and account for 40 per cent of the total job reallocation. Yet most models of job reallocation abstract from temporary workers.

Two major issues dominate the analysis and policy discussion in this Monetary Policy Report: the nature and extent of the global economic slowdown that began late last year and the consequences of the terrorist attacks in the United States.