Canada's population is booming. Only one province is building enough homes

The most important thing in Canada’s economy is the tremendous acceleration in population growth, driven by a bold decision to significantly boost immigration. Partially due to a post-COVID return of international students, Canada’s population grew 2.7% in 2022. That’s (at least) a 60-year high.

And, it’s not just Ontario. Six of the 10 provinces, including all the Maritimes, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Ontario are at 60-year record highs. Alberta and Newfoundland are close to their records. B.C. is running at ~2.5x its 2000 to 2015 average (red dot).

Many provinces are experiencing a growth whiplash, especially the Maritimes, which had gotten used to - and were planning for - a slow decline.

How are we handling this growth? Not well. The simplest constraint is housing. We aren’t building enough homes to accommodate our population growth. There are variations by province, but for most provinces, we added 5 to 7 new residents for every new home (typical household size is about 2 to 2.5) in 2022. Big gaps between housing and population growth force bidding wars and housing scarcity.

Only Quebec is even close to building enough for its population growth (which is, admittedly, the lowest in the country). But if I can frame it differently, Quebec’s population is growing just over half the rate of Ontario, but Quebec builds 40% more homes, adjusting for population, than Ontario (and Nova Scotia).