Average Canadian weekly pay up to $788

OTTAWA, May 29 (UPI) -- Average weekly earnings for Canadians rose 0.3 percent to $788.71 in March from February, the Statistics Canada agency reported Thursday.

The figure represents a 3.2 percent gain over March 2007, the report said.

Nationally, the number of payroll jobs edged up 0.05 percent from February to March 2008, to a total of 14,497,000.

For hourly paid employees, the national average rate was $19.83, a monthly gain of 0.8 percent. However, the average weekly hours for hourly paid employees dropped 1.0 percent to 30.8 hours, StatsCan said.

By sector, compared with March 2007, earnings rose 4.3 percent in health and social assistance, 2.7 percent in retail trade, 2.6 percent in educational services and 2.3 percent in manufacturing, the agency said.