Two million people are expected to leave the country in Canada's immigration reset. What if they don't?

financialpost.com:

Despite moving to Canada from India in 2018 as an international student and receiving a work permit upon graduating two years later, Dinesh* lives in Ontario today as a visitor even though that was obviously not the original plan.

But with no other way to extend his stay in Canada after the expiry of his work permit in July, the 25-year-old decided to “convert” his status by applying for a visitor visa.

“I did that to stay a little bit longer with hopes of qualifying for an immigration draw,” he said. “I am doing my best to learn French and improve my immigration points so that I can somehow, someway, be saved and can stay here rather than going back.”

More than two million newcomers such as Dinesh are expected to leave Canada in the next two years as their permits expire, which is part of the federal government’s plan to reduce the overall number of temporary residents and cut the population growth of the past few years.

But economists and immigration lawyers don’t think it’s realistic to expect such a large volume of international students and temporary foreign workers to leave in such a short time. They expect many to convert their residential permits, like Dinesh did, to prolong their stay.

Being classified a visitor, though, comes with its own set of problems, as Dinesh has learned in the past six months. He can’t work on a visitor’s permit, so he has had to cut down on his spending and now lives in a shared apartment, as opposed to living on his own previously. Many others are in the same boat, raising concerns about both their welfare and whether the government’s immigration cutbacks will have any real effect.

Dinesh, a former service technician who used to fix computers and printers for a living, didn’t want to