Canada's Unemployment Rate For decades prior to the 1981-82 recession, the national unemployment rates of Canada and the United States had been nearly identical. Since then, a persistent "unemployment rate gap" has emerged. Throughout most of the 1980s, Canada's unemployment rate has consistently been about 2 percentage points higher than in the United States. The gap developed in spite of very similar economic performances across the two countries: the growth rate of real per capita incomes has been virtually identical since 1976. However, now, well into the 90s, the gap has widened much more significa