Canada in 2050
By Tu Tran
Introduction
Current Immigration
Canada uses immigration as its primary source of population growth, with the most common countries that Canada receives immigrants from being China, India, the Philippines, Pakistan, and the United States.
China, India, and the Philippines each making up about 12% of immigrants that Canada receives. Combined with the immigrants received from the United States and Pakistan, this accounts for nearly half of all immigrants in Canada.
Currently, there are three major classes of immigrants: Family Immigrants, Economic Immigrants, and Refugees:
- Family Immigrants are sponsored by their family currently living in Canada, and are permitted to enter Canada because they have family that permanently resides in Canada.
- Economic Immigrants are immigrants that are allowed to enter Canada with the goal of getting a job, allowing them to contribute to Canada's economy.
- Refugees are immigrants allowed to enter Canada in order to escape war or political strife in their old country.
Future Of Immigration
For the future, I believe that Canada will receive more and more immigrants from China and India, due to the fact that their populations are very large. Looking at the past, China's immigration to Canada was still very large even despite the head tax associated with them from 1885-1923. With compensations and apologies for the head tax in recent times, it is possible that Chinese immigration will increase, as one of the largest intervening obstacles was put out of practice.
With the ongoing war and strife in the Middle East, it is very possible that the peaceful Canada will receive more refugees from those countries, evidenced by countries like Pakistan already being within the top 5 countries of immigration to Canada. As the second image below shows, a large portion of Canada's immigrants come from the Middle East, a number which will only grow if the conflict there continues.
Canada's Immigration in 2012
Location of Canadian Immigrants
Immigrants of Canada by country of birth
First Nations Current Situation
Aboriginals currently struggle with small, limited reserves, lack of shelter, food, health care, and money, which, combined with a relative lack of relief programs, results in a very difficult existence.
In 1995, an estimated 55% of all aboriginals were in poverty, while in 2001, this was down to 52%. In some provinces, aboriginals can account for up to 24% of the poor. This data shows that things are getting better, albeit slowly. Newer programs like British Columbia's Seabird Sustainable Community Program are trying to eliminate poverty altogether, aboriginals included.
Perhaps due to a lack of natural resistance, aboriginals are considerably more likely to have some kind of illness compared to a non-aboriginal, such as being ten times more likely to have tuberculosis. Health care is showing up more and more for natives, such as a 1997 program that provided health care for natives specifically. More recent innovations are beginning to incorporate the spiritual practices of the aboriginals.
Aboriginals were stated to be five to six times more likely to be unemployed than non-aboriginals. In 2008, only 10% of aboriginals were unemployed, showing a substantial decrease. In 1995, 71% of employers had issues with hiring aboriginals, most commonly due to a lack of a method of communication.
This unfortunately goes hand in hand with the fact that roughly only a third of aboriginals have completed high school. However, when comparing results of how many aboriginals had an education, one can see that there is a substantial increase from 1964 to 1991, with 800 and 150000 aboriginals being recorded to have education, respectively.
Future Situation of the First Nations
With all this data showing that things are getting better for aboriginals, I believe it is safe to assume that the situation for the aboriginals will continue to get better. However, progress will happen slowly, as shown how in the gap between 1995 and 2001, the rate of poverty in aboriginals went down from 55% to 52%, roughly at a rate of 0.5% per year.
This could possibly mean that by 2050, poverty could be as low as 10% among aboriginals if this rate is held, although it is unlikely. Employment and education for aboriginals is increasing very quickly, with more and more aboriginals receiving education off of the reserves.
All in all, the aboriginal's situation will be the best it's been yet in 2050, possibly even on par with the rates of the non-aboriginals. However, the employment status of the aboriginals is linked to the status of the non-aboriginals, meaning that if the economy were to ever experience an unlikely crash, their unemployment rates would increase dramatically as well, as shown in the graph showing the employment rates in Canada during the 2009 recession.
Current Demography
As the population pyramid below shows, less and less children are being born, meaning that as the older people and baby boomers age, there will be less people to take their places. This is a bad sign, as it means that, without intervention, Canada will not have enough people to balance out the number of deaths the country is experiencing.
This is a major reason that Canada is focusing on immigration, to ensure that the population will remain stable, without too many deaths and too little births resulting in a lower population. The largest portion of people in Canada are within the 40-50 age range, classified as baby boomers, born in the era following World War II.
Future Demography
This leads me to believe that the population pyramid will eventually begin to slant inwards, and as the baby boomers age and die (presumably around 2030 based on Canada's life expectancy), the pyramid will become noticeably thinner as a whole, representing a situation of negative growth as the number of deaths will outnumber the number of births.
By that point, Canada will have to completely rely on immigration in order to increase its population.
In relation to that, as space begins to run out in the Greater Toronto Area, people will be forced to begin spreading out to other locations in Canada. As such, it is possible that by then, Ontario and Quebec will no longer hold over half of Canada's population, as people begin moving to other provinces such as British Columbia, which currently holds roughly 13% of Canada's population, compared to Quebec's 22% and Ontario's 38%.
Below are other organization's estimates on how Canada's population pyramid will appear in 2050, and a video explaining.
Population Pyramid 1
Population Pyramid 2
Population Pyramid 3
Video
Conclusion
Canada's population development is soon coming to a close.
Bibliography & Credits
"Aboriginal Peoples." Statistics Canada. The Government Of Canada, n.d. Web. 14 March 2014.
"Population by Provinces and Territories." InfoPlease. Pearson Education, n.d. Web. 14 March 2014.
Population Pyramids belong to PopulationPyramid.net and the US Census Bureau.
Pie Chart created with Meta-Chart.com.