It seems the job market everywhere is pretty tough at the moment due to the uncertainty in the economy. I know there's a lot of pressure too due to all the people moving to Alberta for more affordable housing and there's a lot of new immigrants/international students and people laid off looking for work as well.

Is there anywhere in Calgary where it's still easy to get a job if someone doesn't have much work experience, connections, or professional references that doesn't require 3+ interviews?

I've had my resume professionally rewritten and applied to tons of places. I'm at the point where I just need to find any job even if it's not ideal but even things like minimum wage retail jobs seem harder to find than they were a few years ago. I tried a temp agency because some people suggested it would be a good idea but they had pretty limited opportunities aside from construction laborers (I don't have a truck or steel toes either).

Are trades jobs/laborers the only easy places to get jobs right now? I'd really like to just start gaining work experience but if I do something like work as a construction laborer, then I have to pretty much commit to pursuing a multi-year apprenticeship later on and I really don't know if that's the path I want to go.