The unemployment rate fell a tenth of a percentage point to 6.6% in October, Statistics Canada said today. That’s the lowest it has been since April 1975.

The government agency said the Canadian economy churned out 68,700 new jobs last month, nearly quadrupling economists’ predictions of 20,000 new positions.

StatsCansaid most of the new jobs were in the private sector and of the part-time variety.

Employment growth in the trade sector, especially retail, was particularly strong.

“The largest gains were in furniture and home furnishing stores as well as building material and garden equipment dealers,” the agency said.

Factory jobs continued to decline, with the disappearance of 7,700 manufacturing positions. In the last year, the country has lost 128,600 factory jobs as the high Canadian dollar puts the squeeze on exporters.

“Although weakness continues to be widespread, the largest declines have occurred in furniture, machinery, and textile processing as well as in printing activities” StatsCan said.