No country has messed up immigration policy more than Canada.
Every system—housing, infrastructure, employment, and healthcare—is in chaos.
Unprecedented net overseas migration drove a population increase of nearly 1.3 million last year:
This population boom has left Canada severely short of housing:
Housing starts have lagged well behind population increase:
As such, the rental vacancy rate in Canada is at an all-time low:
Canadian rental inflation has subsequently shot up:
Because housing, infrastructure, and business investment have lagged behind, the population boom has also negatively impacted Canadian productivity.
The National Bank of Canada recently warned that the nation is caught in a “population trap” whereby there is a “lack the infrastructure and capital stock in this country to adequately absorb current population growth and improve our standard of living”:
“Our policymakers should set Canada’s population goals against the constraint of our capital stock, which goes beyond the supply of housing, if we are to improve our productivity”, stated analysts from the National Bank of Canada.
The Bank of Nova Scotia reached the same conclusion, alerting that two thirds of the “massive” fall in productivity over the previous two years is due to the current spike in immigration-driven population growth:
Two reasons combined to cause the decline in productivity: 1) Canada’s historically low business investment, and 2) its sharp population increase.
The situation has gotten so bad that the Bank of Canada says productivity is at “emergency” levels.
“You’ve seen those signs that say, ‘In emergency, break glass.’ Well, it’s time to break the glass”, Carolyn Rogers, the Bank of Canada’s senior deputy governor, said in March.
“When you compare Canada’s recent productivity record with that of other countries, what really sticks out is how much we lag on investment in machinery, equipment and, importantly, intellectual property”.
“Too often, new Canadians are working in jobs that don’t take advantage of the skills they already possesses. And too often these people wind up stuck in low-wage, low-productivity jobs”, she said.
On Friday, the National Bank of Canada released a report on Canada’s GDP results for the March quarter, which rose by 0.2% but continued to decline at an alarming rate in real per capita terms:
“GDP per capita continued to trend down and is now 3% below its peak of September 2022”, the National Bank of Canada said.
“A decline of this magnitude has never been seen outside of a recession”.
“This ‘solid’ growth in the quarter did not prevent the unemployment rate from rising, another sign that economic growth was below potential”.
Indeed, businesses are going bankrupt at an alarming rate across Canada:
As a result, the number of active businesses has fallen for the first time since the height of the pandemic:
Canada’s predicament should sound alarm bells in Australia.
Canada is living proof of what could happen in Australia if Anthony Albanese continues to pursue the same braindead mass migration policies as his mate, Justin Trudeau.
Australia is halfway there already.
