[Drybrain]

If you look at the population data released this week and look at the "components of population growth" for provinces and territories, you can see that interprovincial migration is positive for Nova Scotia from July 2016 to June 2017, but a bit down from the previous year's high. Likewise, immigration is down a bit, but still the second-highest since at least 1970, which is as far back as the records go.

So it looks like we'll grow more slowly this year than last, but still far above recent norms. Also, the immigration decline isn't discouraging, since 2015-16 was bolstered by a one-time shot of about 1,200 Syrian refugees, most of whom arrived in that period of time. Subtract that one-time anomaly and 2016-17 was right around the previous year's level, or a bit above. Which is double what we used to typically get.