Saturday Huddle: From Bubble to Boom
The Saturday Huddle is a weekly column that features opinion, analysis, and reflections on Huddle stories, podcasts, and business news in the region. Trevor Nichols is Huddle’s editor.
Remember during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic, when most of the country was still locked away in isolation but we in Atlantic Canada, safe in our “Atlantic Bubble,” had a little bit of freedom?
It was a great feeling, and not just because the bubble represented a sliver of normalcy after what felt like eons of loneliness and isolation.
The Bubble came with this strange sense of regional pride. Atlantic Canada’s pandemic response received global attention. Correct or not, it felt like we were doing something right, handling things better than the rest of the country.
I think it was cathartic for a lot of Atlantic Canadians because, for as long as most of us can remember, we’ve been the sob story of the country: struggling economy, declining population, dying industries. These were what people thought of when they thought about Atlantic Canada’s economy.
On this week’s Insights Podcast, Don Mills and David Campbell had a fascinating conversation with Public Policy Forum President Ed Greenspon and former P.E.I. premier Wade MacLauchlan about the recently released Atlantic Canada Momentum Index.
The Index puts into measurable terms what many of us have been feeling for the past five or so years: things in the region are getting better. Our economy and quality of life are improving faster, and we’re quickly catching up to the rest of the country.
That’s a big deal for a region that’s been maligned for decades. To many in Central and Western Canada, the East Coast is like a charming “poor cousin” that can’t really make it on its own.
For those of us who grew up and live here, it’s an infuriating attitude. The problem, of course, is that the underlying facts have largely justified it.
For decades, Atlantic Canada experienced a steady population decline compared to the rest of the country.
In 1961, the region had about 1.9 million people compared to Canada’s 18.3 million. That meant Atlantic Canadians made up about 10 per cent of the country’s population. By 2021, Canada’s population was more than 38 million, while Atlantic Canada had grown to just 2.5 million, which was only 6.5 per cent.
However, in 2021-2022 population growth in Atlantic Canada exceeded the national average, and the trend appears set to continue.
And population is just one of several indicators here trending above and beyond the rest of the country.
The Index tracks 20 indicators pegged to economy and quality of life, including things like housing starts, GDP per capita, access to doctors, population growth, and more. If an indicator is improving at a certain rate, it’s considered to have “momentum.”
Canada has positive momentum in 10 of the 20 categories. Atlantic Canada is outpacing that significantly with momentum in 16 categories.
While the country as a whole shows negative momentum in all three of the index’s “macro economy” indicators, it’s green across the board in Atlantic Canada. Similarly, Labour market performance looks weak Canada-wide while Atlantic Canada has momentum in all but one indicator.
Don and David’s chat with Ed and Wade about the Index and the general sense of optimism in Atlantic Canada was illuminating.
As they pointed out, the Atlantic Bubble and our region’s overall handling of the pandemic put a spotlight on us that caused many in the rest of the country to reconsider those poor cousins to the east.
But the momentum we’re seeing now has been building since the middle of the 2010s. The index puts into hard numbers something many in the region have felt happening since then. Don and David have been telling that story of success and growth every week through the Insights podcast.
While things are going well in Atlantic Canada right now, Ed and Wade warned that there is still work to be done in the region.
Technically, the Maritimes are still very much in the “have-not” category.
Between the three provinces, we receive $6 billion of equalization payments from the federal government each year. It would be borderline impossible to run our government without that federal windfall.
And some of the indicators in the Index we are behind on are big ones: employment income and outside investment are both still in pretty bad shape relative to the rest of the country.
But stacked next to our relative success in all the other areas, those challenges feel manageable. The real question we need to be asking now is: how well will we manage them?