For those 15 or older the proportion involved in the formal labour market is substantially lower than the Yukon average. This reflects both the limited economy of Carcross and Tagish and the older-than-average population. In 2003, 80 percent of Yukon adults said they were active in the labour market. In both Carcross and Tagish, this proportion was about 60 percent. Unemployment is also significantly higher in both Carcross and Tagish than the Yukon average. In the 2001 Census, about 20-25 percent of the workforce said they were unemployed. This was about double the Yukon-wide rate of 12 percent. Men reported even higher unemployment. The unemployment situation in these communities did improve slightly from 1996 to 2001.An average of 38 people claimed employment insurance (formerly unemployment insurance) in Carcross in 2003, and a further 20 in Tagish. The number of community people claiming employment insurance has remained fairly steady for a few years. The relatively high number of employment insurance claimants in Carcross and Tagish is a further indication of the seasonal nature of work there.
The communities' young people, those aged 15 to 24, are less likely to be involved in the labour market than are youth in the Yukon as a whole. Just under half of Carcross youth said they were in the formal labour market (compared to 68 percent Yukon-wide); the majority say they are unemployed. This indicates that few jobs are available in the two communities for young people.
Although the 2001 Census provided no measure of full-time, full year work for the communities of Carcross and Tagish, other information clearly indicates that much of the work in the communities is related to tourism, and therefore seasonal.
Information on self-employment, drawn from the Census, shows that a similar proportion of people in Carcross and Tagish are self-employed and that this self-employment is close to the Yukon average.
Earnings information was not available from the 2001 Census.
In both communities, the largest occupational area is sales and service occupations linked to tourism; for example, food and accommodation service jobs. The First Nation is a large employer. Another consistent employment area is transportation and trades, which includes driving and construction or maintenance trades. Other than these groupings, the numbers reported in the Census are too small to indicate type of occupation. Some of these jobs are local; others are in Whitehorse and people commute to them.
