Posthaste: Who says cities are dead? These four are driving Canada's economy
Canada’s big cities took the toughest knocks during the pandemic, as families fled to the suburbs and beyond and office buildings emptied out.
Yet despite concerns about “big city cores getting hollowed out,” the reality is they still drive Canada’s economic activity, says a report from Bank of Montreal economists Robert Kavcic and Erik Johnson.
The economists say Canada’s four biggest cities — Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary — have bounced back from the pandemic shock — albeit with a few bumps and scrapes.
Employment in these cities is now 8 per cent higher than in 2019, compared to 6 per cent for the rest of Canada, the report says.
Some industries such as restaurants, hotels and other direct services are still below their past peaks, but surging employment in other areas has made up for it.
Professional and technical industries, education, finance and public administration have all soared above pre-COVID levels, suggesting that big cities are not being hollowed out, but the sources of growth are reshaping, said the economists.
“In an economy where knowledge sector jobs are increasingly driving employment growth, cities will remain important engines of economic activity,” they said.
A look at BMO’s chart below shows that even during the depths of the pandemic the contribution of the country’s biggest cities was staggering, with Toronto’s output towering over the provinces.
In 2020, the four largest cities accounted for 44 per cent of Canada’s gross domestic product and 41 per cent of total employment.
“When it comes to overall economic activity, the big cities are still providing significant muscle,” they said.
The high of cost of living continues to drive younger families out. The economists said by mid-2022
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