An overview of the service sector

Virtually all services involve a direct interaction between producers and consumers, whether it's face to face (as in retailing, personal services, health care, or live entertainment), or more remotely (as in the case of Internet access or television broadcasting). We also benefit indirectly from some types of services, such as national defence or policing services.

There are 11 main industry groupings, or sub-sectors, within the service sector:

Table 1 shows the relative size of these industries, based on employment and GDP in 2008, while Table 2 summarizes some of the key economic and labour force variables for industries within this sector.

Four out of five workers in BC are employed in the service sector. The largest employer in the sector is wholesale & retail trade, followed by health care & social assistance and accommodation & food services. The smallest industry in this sector (other services) employs more people (101,200) than agriculture, mining, oil & gas, forestry & logging, utilities and fishing, hunting & trapping combined (93,300).

As was the case in the goods sector, industry rankings based on employment are quite different from those based on GDP. When GDP is the basis for comparison, finance, insurance, real estate & leasing is easily the biggest industry in the service sector, and is substantially larger than any of the goods-producing industries. Nearly a quarter of the province's GDP originates in this industry. However, it is ranked sixth out of 11 service sector industries based on employment. In contrast, accommodation & food, which employs about 8% of the workforce, makes a much smaller contribution (4%) to BC's total GDP.

Table 1
Employment and GDP in the Service Sector

2008 Data	Employment			Gross domestic product
	Thousands	Percent of total, services	Percent of total, all industries	GDP in $2002 Million (chained)	Percent of total, services	Percent of total, all industries
All industries	2,314.3		100.0	150,239		100.0
Services	1,812.8	100.0	78.3	115,912	100.0	77.2
Wholesale & retail trade	354.8	19.6	15.3	17,944	15.5	11.9
Health & social assistance	245.6	13.5	10.6	9,855	8.5	6.6
Accomodation & food	178.1	9.8	7.7	4,618	4.0	3.1
Professional, scientific & technical services	174.0	9.6	7.5	7,014	6.1	4.7
Education	161.6	8.9	7.0	7,968	6.9	5.3
Finance, insurance, real estate & leasing	147.2	8.1	6.4	35,327	30.5	23.5
Transpotation & warehousing	128.0	7.1	5.5	9,717	8.4	6.5
Information, culture & recreation	118.1	6.5	5.1	7,603	6.6	5.1
Public administration	102.9	5.7	4.4	7,846	6.8	5.2
Business, building & support services	101.2	5.6	4.4	3,422	3.0	2.3
Other services	101.2	5.6	4.4	4,638	4.0	3.1

Data Source: Statistics Canada & BC Stats
Note: The GDP figures do not sum to the published totals because they are chained (chained data are not additive except in the base year, which is currently 2002)

Table 2
Key Labour Market Indicators for the Service Sector

	2008 Data					Average (1990-2008)
	Average hourly wage rate ($)	Usual hours worked each week	Percent employed full-time	Percent self-employed	Percent female	Unemployment rate (%)
All industries	21.46	35.9	79.9	18.5	46.8	7.8
Services	21.09	34.7	76.7	17.4	54.0	4.8
Wholesale & retail trade	16.76	33.9	74.0	12.3	50.4	5.1
Health & social assistance	23.55	33.8	74.5	15.1	80.5	2.6
Accomodation & food	13.00	30.5	60.5	9.3	58.1	7.9
Professional, scientific & technical services	25.96	37.3	83.7	35.7	44.3	4.0
Education	26.90	32.6	72.0	7.4	64.2	3.6
Finance, insurance, real estate & leasing	22.76	36.1	83.4	23.0	57.8	2.7
Transportation & warehousing	23.52	40.6	87.7	19.9	23.4	4.6
Information, culture & recreation	21.65	34.0	75.4	19.6	44.8	6.4
Public administration	28.16	36.8	92.3	-	46.6	3.0
Business, building & support services	17.02	34.7	76.8	29.2	44.6	9.2
Other services	18.20	35.6	77.3	30.7	56.2	5.3

Data Source: Statistics Canada