Statistics Canada Reports II

[nclsteba]

CMA's population estimates will be released tomorrow :

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/n1/dai-quo/cal2-eng.htm

[giallo]

It should be interesting to see after 2024.

[Harrison]

Yup, will be interesting to see how close Calgary - Edmonton - Ottawa are now as the first two have definitely experienced crazy growth compared to Ottawa in the last 12-24 months.

[ssiguy]

It will be an interesting release but not near as much as next years.

With Canada not renewing any student/TFW Visas and with Ottawa just putting a moratorium on family reunifications.........Canada is going into population decline. This will only accelerate with a PP gov't as he will tighten the immigration numbers even more.

Next years numbers will be far more telling than this one and some of our once booming cities due to student numbers {here's looking at you Kitchener} are going to face the biggest declines.

[kwoldtimer]

Originally Posted by ssiguy

It will be an interesting release but not near as much as next years.

With Canada not renewing any student/TFW Visas and with Ottawa just putting a moratorium on family reunifications.........Canada is going into population decline. This will only accelerate with a PP gov't as he will tighten the immigration numbers even more.

Next years numbers will be far more telling than this one and some of our once booming cities due to student numbers {here's looking at you Kitchener} are going to face the biggest declines.

Geez, what's going to happen to all those Indian restaurants in DTK?

[savevp]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

Geez, what's going to happen to all those Indian restaurants in DTK?

Everywhere where there is a uni or college... I can think of at least four indian restaurants that have opened in the last 2yr in St Catharines CBD. At least two of which replaced Chinese restos that closed after the flow of Mainland students dried up post-Meng Wenzhou.

[blueandgoldguy]

Canada's population won't decline. We will just experience a decrease in immigration to the previous levels of ten or so years ago.

[svlt]

Yeah I highly doubt we will see a decline. Just a stall in growth; at most we hit a standstill where we currently are for most cities which is fine by me as we allow infrastructure to finally try to catch up. Calgary and Edmonton I'm sure will continue to grow, as will (more slowly) Metro Vancouver and Toronto.

[isaidso]

Originally Posted by dahusbandofbath

No way to just like your post, so, "hear, hear!"

Thanks very much. Sadly, people's emotions (in this case anger) and/or agendas often take precedence over the interests of the country and common sense.

[whatnext]

Originally Posted by blueandgoldguy

Canada's population won't decline. We will just experience a decrease in immigration to the previous levels of ten or so years ago.

Let’s see how quick and damaging the Trump tariffs might be. International students might not be so keen on coming to a slumping economy.

[KnoxfordGuy]

Deleted

[kwoldtimer]

I think the decline in population is based on international students and TFWs leaving Canada when their visa expires. It remains to be seen whether that happens.

[Pellimo]

This is it...

https://https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1710014801

[MonctonRad]

CMA/CA Population Estimates July 1st, 2024

Halifax NS (CMA), - 530,167 (+12,186 from last year)
St. John's, NL (CMA) - 239,316 (+6,617 from last year)
Moncton, NB (CMA) - 188,036 (+9,437 from last year)
Saint John, NB (CMA) - 142,433 (+3,338 from last year)
Fredericton, NB (CMA) - 122,500 (+3,700 from last year)
Sydney (CBRM), NS (CA) - 112,699 (+3,428 from last year)
Charlottetown, PE (CA) - 93,877 (+3,349 from last year)

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1710014801

Takeaways:

1) - given a constant growth rate, Moncton is likely around 192,500 right now. By this time next year we could be over 200,000.
2) - Saint John at present is growing nearly as quickly as Fredericton. Good news for SJ. After decades of senescence, they have been experiencing consistent growth recently.
3) - The growth rate in CBRM is really surprising. I ascribe this to Dave Dingwall and CBU. Once the foreign student pipeline is shut down, things will revert to normal.
4) - The growth rate of Charlottetown appears to be decelerating.
5) - assuming constant growth rates into the future, Moncton may surpass St. John's as Atlantic Canada's second city by 2038 or so.

[Pellimo]

https://www150.statcan.gc.ca/t1/tbl1/en/tv.action?pid=1710014801

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by kwoldtimer

I think the decline in population is based on international students and TFWs leaving Canada when their visa expires. It remains to be seen whether that happens.

It is current policy so PP would have to reverse it or not enforce the law for it to not happen. I don't think he wants the first large scale illegal population to start under his watch. I also think our economy has a lot of barriers to illegal employment outside of a few industries.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

It is current policy so PP would have to reverse it or not enforce the law for it to not happen. I don't think he wants the first large scale illegal population to start under his watch. I also think our economy has a lot of barriers to illegal employment outside of a few industries.

It's pretty obvious that some people are going to figure out ways to stick around. But the idea that a major proportion of temporary residents will illegally remain in the country on expired visas seems implausible at best. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of people.

Honestly, we're already seeing the decline in a few places. The new CMA estimates show that Halifax's population growth really tumbled last year, down to 2.4 per cent (though that would still be a pretty good clip for any CMA, pre-pandemic). This is almost entirely due to the fact that non-permanent residents declined by 60 per cent from the previous year. That's probably due to the cap on international students who comprised a large part of the city's temporary residents, and also because the city had a low unemployment rate, making it harder for employers to bring in TFWs under the new federal rules.

Most CMAs haven't yet seen that kind of drop in temporary residents (many saw increased numbers) but that will change through 2025, and growth rates will fall correspondingly. I think we do have to be watchful for bunk asylum claims and the like, but I don't think hundreds of thousands of people are going to be hunkering down undocumented nationwide.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

It's pretty obvious that some people are going to figure out ways to stick around. But the idea that a major proportion of temporary residents will illegally remain in the country on expired visas seems implausible at best. We're talking about hundreds of thousands of people.

Honestly, we're already seeing the decline in a few places. The new CMA estimates show that Halifax's population growth really tumbled last year, down to 2.4 per cent (though that would still be a pretty good clip for any CMA, pre-pandemic). This is almost entirely due to the fact that non-permanent residents declined by 60 per cent from the previous year. That's probably due to the cap on international students who comprised a large part of the city's temporary residents, and also because the city had a low unemployment rate, making it harder for employers to bring in TFWs under the new federal rules.

Most CMAs haven't yet seen that kind of drop in temporary residents (many saw increased numbers) but that will change through 2025, and growth rates will fall correspondingly. I think we do have to be watchful for bunk asylum claims and the like, but I don't think hundreds of thousands of people are going to be hunkering down undocumented nationwide.

Yes this all seems like solid analysis. The idea of actual population decline is such a paradigm shift that there is a lot of disbelief. Every real estate investor I know thinks it's impossible. It would be a huge change in many industries with a lot of shocks. There will be a lot of winners too of course. If you are a less educated person from Northern Ontario, Rural Maritimes etc you will be able to get much better wages with much lower rent by moving to a city than has been the case for many years. But we will see construction grind to a halt and labour shortages across many industries. If we are run by big business as many assume they will back down from this path.

[Drybrain]

Originally Posted by YOWetal

Yes this all seems like solid analysis. The idea of actual population decline is such a paradigm shift that there is a lot of disbelief. Every real estate investor I know thinks it's impossible. It would be a huge change in many industries with a lot of shocks. There will be a lot of winners too of course. If you are a less educated person from Northern Ontario, Rural Maritimes etc you will be able to get much better wages with much lower rent by moving to a city than has been the case for many years. But we will see construction grind to a halt and labour shortages across many industries. If we are run by big business as many assume they will back down from this path.

This is probably my actual real concern--rather than use the respite to keep building out of our housing deficit, builders will be spooked as vacancy rates rise, rents decline gently and population growth slows. (Nevermind that vacancy rates will probably be merely healthy, and rents will still be near historic highs.) Add to that newfound economic uncertainty around tariffs, etc.

Then in a couple of years, when growth picks up, we'll only be marginally further ahead than we are now.

[YOWetal]

Originally Posted by Drybrain

This is probably my actual real concern--rather than use the respite to keep building out of our housing deficit, builders will be spooked as vacancy rates rise, rents decline gently and population growth slows. (Nevermind that vacancy rates will probably be merely healthy, and rents will still be near historic highs.) Add to that newfound economic uncertainty around tariffs, etc.

Then in a couple of years, when growth picks up, we'll only be marginally further ahead than we are now.

I think we might be actually behind where we are now as the supply coming online gets absorbed and we accumulate a labour shortage when we see another burst of immigration we will have no housing in the pipeline. Meanwhile we might see a retreat by the Feds from housing.

I would like to see a massive federal plan to build University residences. Allowing a strong return to students in late 2020s with a requirement they live on campus. They are a huge money maker and could also be a flexible workforce adjusting how many hours they work based on economic conditions but bringing in students with the $ to actually support themselves.

We could also make it a requirement that employers hiring TFWs provide housing. While most of this will see them buy current housing the knock on effects of that would see some construction.

Finally we could adjust the economic immigration program to give a lot of points to having a sibling or cousin who can provide housing for the relative. This is bit hard to police but at least an immigrant with someone with a large house offering to house their relative is less likely to need housing even if it's not 0% it's not 100%.