I’m surprised people are going where housing is so expensive, where are they living?
Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
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Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#42As with many western countries, there's a rising sentiment against immigration due to the lack of infrastructure provided to the existing citizenry. Housing in Canada is some of the least affordable in the world, our health care system is deeply underfunded, competition for spots at post secondary is rising as the institutions accept more international students as they're cash cows, and we're slowly seeing a rise in populism with the the Conservative Party electing Pierre Poilievre who is a Trump-lite figure who rails on about being for the working class while simultaneously voting against dental coverage for poor children [1].
It genuinely feels like the political class has abandoned its people and has sold out to special interest groups entirely. We import tons of TFW's (temporary foreign workers) to appease the corps to have cheap labour, and these TFW's are often treated terribly by the corps. As a first generation Canadian who is the child of refugees, I really do worry about the future of this country. I know tons of couples who are putting off having kids entirely because of the bleak economic picture in our major cities. We need immigration due to the low birthrate, but there's significant resentment from those who want kids and simply cannot afford them which is pushing down our numbers further.
[1] https://www.ctvnews.ca/politics/ndp-calls-out-poilievre-and-...
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#43Canada has an immigration rate 10x the rate of the US but any discussion of lowering this is considered racist. I have a top 5% income but I will never own a house in my life and can’t access a family doctor. We have way too many people! The population is expected to be 50% foreign born or children of immigrants by 2040 and it’s already majority foreign born in our biggest cities. I honestly don’t expect this country…
Not having access to doctors or being unable to afford housing are due to policy failures in other areas, not purely due to higher immigration. Canada will find it tough to replenish it's workforce without high rates of immigration.
Canada has a housing crisis because no one is stupid enough to arrive to Canada and move to Thunder Bay (sorry TB, but you know its true). As a result all these people go live in one of three or four cities.
The situation is more akin to the rapid urbanization in the third world. Infrastructure cant keep up. Just try GTA traffic. People move to Barrie just to afford a house in the GTA (Barries not GTA!).
Sure Canada is "empty", but its also an inhospitable frozen waste land with 90% of the population living within 100 km of the US border. When we say Canada is "full" what we mean is that Canada cannot build fast enough. That the 3000 km^2 worth living in in Canada are really really dense.
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#44I’m surprised people are going where housing is so expensive, where are they living?
Housing in Canada is expensive for North America. Relative to incomes it remains cheap.
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#45I wonder how much if america's worker shortage issues can be fixed by fixing immigration. Free higher education at public colleges can also go a long way. We need more people who get this stuff but hate politics to become politicians.
When corporations and the wealthy complain about worker shortages it seems to me they really just don’t want to have to raise wages or improve working conditions to attract workers. Or in the case of jobs that require certain training or education they don’t want to have to provide that training or education.
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#46Earlier quoted context omitted.
> We have way too many people! We're one of the least densely populated countries in the world with one of the lowest birth rates in the world. If you don't think immigration makes sense for cultural reasons that's fine, but with respect to healthcare and housing don't be under any illusion -- reducing immigration would exacerbate these issues by giving us an even more heavily aging population.
healthcare availability, housing availability, and immigration rate are not related by population density, but by population growth and infrastructure growth. If your infrastructure growth doesn't outpace your population growth, it doesn't matter how dense or not dense your country is.
Existing infrastructure is not designed for an aging population.
But it’s good that you point out the real problem which is a lack of infrastructure.
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#47Most of them are being thrown into the entry job that people are claiming "couldn't be filled anyways". I remember hunting for my first job as a teenager and it was pretty difficult, not a lot of openings, even less willing to take someone with zero experience. I'm not even that old, that was maybe 7-8 years ago. Many of these locations have a bias in their hiring as well, they gift their family and friends positions…
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Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#48Earlier quoted context omitted.
So build more houses and train more doctors then? Seems weird to hate on immigrants and say your country is overpopulated (it isn’t)
Chinese buyers would simply buy them all with cash and rent the, back to you
That’s cool, build more of them then and pocket the cash. Free money and property taxes for your local economy.
Is “Chinese buyers” supposed to sound scary or something? Honestly this reeks of xenophobia.
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#49Canada is pretty much screwed without immigration, because nobody's having babies and the top talent keeps leaving to the US. Without immigration, they'd have a largely older population and not enough people to pay taxes for their free healthcare (which I don't think is sustainable or great even with immigration).
Canada is also pretty selective about the skilled immigrants they let in, they don't do a random lottery or FIFO but have a points based system. You may argue about the parameters of how points are scored, but there's little doubt that it's better than a lottery.
Re: Immigration accounts for over 94% of Canada’s population growth in Q2 of 2022
#50Canada has an immigration rate 10x the rate of the US but any discussion of lowering this is considered racist. I have a top 5% income but I will never own a house in my life and can’t access a family doctor. We have way too many people! The population is expected to be 50% foreign born or children of immigrants by 2040 and it’s already majority foreign born in our biggest cities. I honestly don’t expect this country…
And who is going to work in Tim Hortons(or take care of your elderly parents)? At least in Montreal, due to stuff shortages many Tim's are half closed with huge lines or drive throughs only. I have never seen anything like this. Also on Monday are elections in Quebec and all they can talk is about immigrants and how to limit immigration(Quebec has a separate immigration program).
Because there were no Timmy's or nursing homes before we all showed up?