British Columbia’s biggest national and global companies have had mixed results over the past five years, according to data collected on Business in Vancouver’s top national and global companies operating in B.C. list (page 14).
Some companies on the list have had explosive growth in local employment. At No. 3, Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq:AMZN) increased its B.C. employee base 81.8 per cent over the past year to 10,000 in 2022 from 5,500 in 2021. Local employment has grown by 334.8 per cent since 2018. Jim Pattison Group (No. 1) grew B.C. employment 24.8 per cent over the past five years to 23,900 in 2022 from 19,147 in 2018.
Despite the growth experienced by some companies, the aver- age B.C. employment at the top national and global companies in the province has remained relatively stagnant over the past five years, increasing only 2.3 per cent.
During the same five-year period, median employment declined 13.2 per cent to 3,851 employees in 2022 from 4,437.5 in 2018. This suggests that employment at most companies lower on the list is declining while outlier performance by some of the faster-growing companies is pulling the average up.
Only five companies on the list reported employment growth over the past year: Amazon, Wal-mart Inc. (NYSE: WMT) (No. 2), TD Bank Group (TSX: TD) (No. 10), Canfor Corp. (TSX: CFP) (No. 11) and Ledcor Group of Cos. (No. 14).
The local employee base for the rest of the companies on the list either shrank or remained the same.
