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Toronto may not be selling that many new condominiums these days, but population growth remains high across the region. For the 12-month period ending July 2024, the Toronto census metropolitan area added approximately 269k people. And for the 12-month period ending July 2023, it added about 255k people. In the context of Canadian and American cities, this makes it the fastest growing metropolitan area for two years running (see above chart). Lower immigration targets are expected to bring this number down going forward, and so it'll be interesting to see what these numbers look like for the period ending this summer, but this is still over half a million people in two years. I think it's also noteworthy that our housing market turned and pre-construction sales slowed around the middle of 2022, and yet our population growth and immigration levels remained the highest in Canada and the US for at least another two years. Maybe this lag helps us recover sooner than some might expect.
Chart from the Centre for Urban Research and Land Development at TMU; cover photo by Mikayla Martorano on Unsplash
My recent post titled "Canada must become a global superpower" has quickly become one of my most-read posts in the almost 12 years that I have been writing this daily blog. Within a few days, it quickly got to 11x the number of daily views that I typically get.
One of the points that I made was about Canada's population, and specifically the target set by the Century Initiative of 100 million Canadians by 2100. Today I'd like to expand on this point, because I'm seeing more people talk about it on the socials.
At the time of writing this post, Canada's official population clock from Statistics Canada was sitting at 41,591,151 people. So to reach 100 million in the next 75 years, it would mean we would need to grow our population by 58,408,861 people. At first glance, this seems like a big number. And to some, it has proven to be an unsettling proposition. But 75 years is a long time for compounding to work its magic.
For us to reach 100 million Canadians by 2100 it would mean that we would need to grow our population by a compounded annual growth rate of just 1.18% per year. On our current population base, that would mean about 490,000 new people next year. To put this into perspective, since Confederation in 1867, Canada's population growth rate has averaged around 1.2% per year.
So by arguing that we want to reach 100 million Canadians by 2100, we are, in a way, just saying "we should continue what we've been doing since 1867 and not change a whole lot." The status quo should inevitably lead us to 100 million people during this time period.
Of course, history isn't exactly the same. Canada's fertility rate was much higher in previous years. At the beginning of the 20th century it was
Last year, the Feds lowered immigration targets in response to Canadians getting grouchy about the number people entering the country. This is expected to be felt starting this year. RBC estimates that Canada's overall population will shrink by about 0.2% this year and next, before returning to positive growth in 2027 (albeit at a lower rate).
That said, the data we have at our disposal today is backward looking and for the 12 months ending on July 1, 2024, Canada continued to see impressive population growth. Looking at the Greater Golden Horseshoe specifically, it grew by about 382,000 people. The 2023 figure was also revised upward from 340,000 to 367,000.
Here's a table from TMU's Centre for Urban Research and Land Development:
Toronto may not be selling that many new condominiums these days, but population growth remains high across the region. For the 12-month period ending July 2024, the Toronto census metropolitan area added approximately 269k people. And for the 12-month period ending July 2023, it added about 255k people. In the context of Canadian and American cities, this makes it the fastest growing metropolitan area for two years running (see above chart). Lower immigration targets are expected to bring this number down going forward, and so it'll be interesting to see what these numbers look like for the period ending this summer, but this is still over half a million people in two years. I think it's also noteworthy that our housing market turned and pre-construction sales slowed around the middle of 2022, and yet our population growth and immigration levels remained the highest in Canada and the US for at least another two years. Maybe this lag helps us recover sooner than some might expect.
Chart from the Centre for Urban Research and Land Development at TMU; cover photo by Mikayla Martorano on Unsplash
My recent post titled "Canada must become a global superpower" has quickly become one of my most-read posts in the almost 12 years that I have been writing this daily blog. Within a few days, it quickly got to 11x the number of daily views that I typically get.
One of the points that I made was about Canada's population, and specifically the target set by the Century Initiative of 100 million Canadians by 2100. Today I'd like to expand on this point, because I'm seeing more people talk about it on the socials.
At the time of writing this post, Canada's official population clock from Statistics Canada was sitting at 41,591,151 people. So to reach 100 million in the next 75 years, it would mean we would need to grow our population by 58,408,861 people. At first glance, this seems like a big number. And to some, it has proven to be an unsettling proposition. But 75 years is a long time for compounding to work its magic.
For us to reach 100 million Canadians by 2100 it would mean that we would need to grow our population by a compounded annual growth rate of just 1.18% per year. On our current population base, that would mean about 490,000 new people next year. To put this into perspective, since Confederation in 1867, Canada's population growth rate has averaged around 1.2% per year.
So by arguing that we want to reach 100 million Canadians by 2100, we are, in a way, just saying "we should continue what we've been doing since 1867 and not change a whole lot." The status quo should inevitably lead us to 100 million people during this time period.
Of course, history isn't exactly the same. Canada's fertility rate was much higher in previous years. At the beginning of the 20th century it was
Last year, the Feds lowered immigration targets in response to Canadians getting grouchy about the number people entering the country. This is expected to be felt starting this year. RBC estimates that Canada's overall population will shrink by about 0.2% this year and next, before returning to positive growth in 2027 (albeit at a lower rate).
That said, the data we have at our disposal today is backward looking and for the 12 months ending on July 1, 2024, Canada continued to see impressive population growth. Looking at the Greater Golden Horseshoe specifically, it grew by about 382,000 people. The 2023 figure was also revised upward from 340,000 to 367,000.
Here's a table from TMU's Centre for Urban Research and Land Development:
Today, we are 1.26 births per woman (2023), compared to 1.66 in the US (2022). We are now among the countries classified as having "lowest-low fertility." Meaning, we're sub 1.3. What this means is that we are now more dependent on immigration to maintain the same growth rate as before.
At the same time, it's not like we're unaccustomed to high immigration. Between 1901 and 1921, Canada's population increased by almost 3% a year on average. This was in large part because of immigrants from Europe, specifically the British Isles. And between 1901 and 1911, alone, Canada welcomed 1.2 million people. This is at a time when we had just over 5 million people in the entire country.
So in the end, 100 million Canadians by 2100 is probably not all that ambitious. A compound annual growth rate of 1.5% would, for example, have us grow to over 127 million people. That would be more of a stretch. There's also the important question of how quickly are we growing relative to other countries.
Whatever the exact target, I stand by what I said before. We should be aiming to lower the cost of living for Canadians, and in particular housing costs. We should make it easier for families to have more babies, should they choose to. And we should continue to attract the smartest and most ambitious people from around the world.
Nearly three-quarters of this growth was concentrated in the Greater Toronto Area, and about three-quarters of this growth was concentrated in Toronto and Peel at 143,000 and 70,000 people, respectively. These are big numbers, especially during a period of dramatically fewer housing starts.
Of course, going forward, lower household formation should alleviate some of the pressures on our housing market. But zero population growth is not sustainable, not unless we want to end up like Japan with a demographic crisis. So there will be tremendous market pressures to return to positive growth.
At the same time, if we go back to RBC's insight report, it specifically says: "This [lower immigration levels] will help realign housing demand with supply — so long as homebuilding can be sustained near current levels." Yeah, that's not happening. Housing starts in the Toronto region have fallen off a cliff.
So I continue to feel like 2027 will mark an important turning point for our housing market. It could be the year when population growth broadly returns, when we've fully absorbed the supply from the last cycle, and when we suddenly realize we don't have nearly enough new housing. Or at least that's my view.
Cover photo by Richard Hong on Unsplash
Today, we are 1.26 births per woman (2023), compared to 1.66 in the US (2022). We are now among the countries classified as having "lowest-low fertility." Meaning, we're sub 1.3. What this means is that we are now more dependent on immigration to maintain the same growth rate as before.
At the same time, it's not like we're unaccustomed to high immigration. Between 1901 and 1921, Canada's population increased by almost 3% a year on average. This was in large part because of immigrants from Europe, specifically the British Isles. And between 1901 and 1911, alone, Canada welcomed 1.2 million people. This is at a time when we had just over 5 million people in the entire country.
So in the end, 100 million Canadians by 2100 is probably not all that ambitious. A compound annual growth rate of 1.5% would, for example, have us grow to over 127 million people. That would be more of a stretch. There's also the important question of how quickly are we growing relative to other countries.
Whatever the exact target, I stand by what I said before. We should be aiming to lower the cost of living for Canadians, and in particular housing costs. We should make it easier for families to have more babies, should they choose to. And we should continue to attract the smartest and most ambitious people from around the world.
Nearly three-quarters of this growth was concentrated in the Greater Toronto Area, and about three-quarters of this growth was concentrated in Toronto and Peel at 143,000 and 70,000 people, respectively. These are big numbers, especially during a period of dramatically fewer housing starts.
Of course, going forward, lower household formation should alleviate some of the pressures on our housing market. But zero population growth is not sustainable, not unless we want to end up like Japan with a demographic crisis. So there will be tremendous market pressures to return to positive growth.
At the same time, if we go back to RBC's insight report, it specifically says: "This [lower immigration levels] will help realign housing demand with supply — so long as homebuilding can be sustained near current levels." Yeah, that's not happening. Housing starts in the Toronto region have fallen off a cliff.
So I continue to feel like 2027 will mark an important turning point for our housing market. It could be the year when population growth broadly returns, when we've fully absorbed the supply from the last cycle, and when we suddenly realize we don't have nearly enough new housing. Or at least that's my view.
Cover photo by Richard Hong on Unsplash
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