The job vacancy rate is an important economic indicator that summarises companies' hiring intentions and indicates future direction of labour demand. The new Workplace and Employee Survey (WES) allows us to estimate the number of job vacancies in the Canadian economy for the period surveyed. In 1999, 13% of establishements (or 95.4 thousand) reported 286,415 job vacancies. The job vacancy rate was 2.6%. This rate is relatively high, partly because 1999 was a year of strong growth in both total employment and gross domestic product. Higher unemployment rates were associated with lower vacancy rates for the Atlantic provinces, Quebec and British Columbia. Conversely, lower unemployment rates were associated with higher vacancy rates in Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario. In 1999, there were relatively high job vacancy rates both in establishments requiring less-skilled labour (such as retail trade and consumer services industries) and in those with strong skill requirements. Positions that remain vacant for at least four months are used to approximate the number of positions that remain vacant for structural reasons. According to the WES, 46% of vacant positions were in this category resulting in long-term job vacancy rate of 1.2%. Overall, the characteristics of positions vacant for at least four months were similar to those of vacant positions in general. The majority of such positions were in the production category. In profit-oriented establishments, 50% of long-term vacancies originated from retail trade and consumer services industries. All data in this study were drawn from the first survey year of the WES (1999). The WES longitudinal database, which will come into existence with the introduction of the data for 2000, will shed more light on the persistence of job vacancies and how this phenomenon relates to various factors such as the characteristics, practices and business strategies of establishments.