More Than 120,000 People Left Canada Last Year, Marking an Emigration Peak

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More Than 120,000 People Left Canada Last Year, Marking an Emigration Peak

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More than 120,000 Canadians and permanent residents moved out of the country between September of last year and September of this year, according to data from Statistics Canada.
Similar peaks in the departure of citizens and permanent residents have only been seen twice in Canadian history, in 1968 amid a housing bubble in Canada that saw professionals fleeing to the United States, and in 2017 during a regional real estate bubble that mainly occurred in three provinces.

In terms of comparing quarterly numbers, Statistics Canada listed 41,203 emigrants in the third quarter of 2025, up around 1 percent from the same quarter last year though still approximately 30 percent higher than the average annual rolling emigration outflow prior to the pandemic, according to a report by Better Dwelling.

Past Peaks​

The 1968 real estate peak saw rampant land speculation, with a speculation tax eventually introduced in Ontario in 1974 to halt soaring property prices.
This Canadian exodus coincided with a booming U.S. economy and tighter restrictions on Canadians working in the United States under the U.S. Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, which went into effect in July 1968.

The 2017 emigration peak also aligned with a real estate peak, with around 80 percent of emigrants in the second quarter of 2017 hailing from B.C., Quebec, and Ontario, according to Better Dwelling.

As real estate prices rose particularly high in those provinces, B.C. and Ontario both put in speculation taxes to try to stem the peak.

Living Abroad​

In 2017, the countries with the highest number of those born in Canada living abroad were the United States at 893,491, the UK at 91,545, and Australia at 56,651, according to a 2022 Statistics Canada report.
The year 2024 saw 81,601 people leave Canada, 39,430 of whom were from Ontario, according to a report from the liv.rent platform. B.C., Alberta, and Quebec were the next leading sources of emigrants, with 18 percent of emigrants leaving from B.C. and 13 percent each from Quebec and Alberta.

Alberta was also the only province last year to grow in terms of interprovincial migration, experiencing a surge of more than 30,000 people moving to that province from within Canada.
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Why a Growing Number of Canadians Are Leaving the Country for Good—and What’s Driving Them Away

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Lauren Chervinski left Canada two years ago and says she has no regrets. The 34-year-old Winnipeg native, who lived in Vancouver for her last seven years in Canada, moved to West Palm Beach, Florida, with her husband in August 2024. She says her new home offers increased financial opportunity, cheaper real estate prices, and safer streets.

Running a small yacht repair company with her husband, Chervinski said they saw their revenue grow by 50 percent in the first year.

“The most common theme I hear among people who want to leave Canada is that they’re not confident in the direction that the country is headed,” she said in an interview, noting that she’s heard this feedback from Canadians she’s helped move as part of her consulting business, as well as the expats she’s met in Florida.
Chervinski’s story is part of a broader trend that’s begun to show up in official data, with Statistics Canada listing approximately 120,000 people emigrating out of the country over a 12-month period between September 2024 and September 2025. This follows a similar trend in recent years showing increasing rates of emigration.
Some 94,576 people emigrated from Canada from mid-2022 to mid-2023, an increase of 1.8 percent from 92,876 in the year-earlier period, and up sharply from 66,627 in the period from mid-2020 to mid-2021, which fell during the pandemic lockdowns, according to data from StatCan.

Data Challenge​

Canada’s overall population went down by 0.2 percent between July 1 to Oct. 1 of last year. Slight population increases in the first quarter of 2025 were driven entirely by immigrants coming into Canada, as deaths outnumbered births during that period. Unlike various European nations, Canada does not track details on emigration, including demographic data.
Economist Jack Mintz, president’s fellow at the University of Calgary’s School of Public Policy, says this gap in Canadian emigration data is a serious shortcoming.

“We have very poor emigration data,” Mintz told The Epoch Times. “First of all, we don’t know if it’s young people that have left relative to older people. We [also] don’t know by income group who’s leaving.”

Better Opportunities, Cheaper Housing​

Mintz said that according to his own research there are “various reasons” Canadians are leaving, depending on their lifestyle, profession, and demographics. When it comes to the younger demographic, he says it often comes down to the United States offering better opportunities and more affordable housing relative to income.
“I think it’s the opportunities, the income,“ Mintz said. ”U.S. incomes are now so much higher than Canada. And then if you can go to Midwest part of the United States with low housing prices, they are pretty reasonable.”

Kim Moody, a tax expert whose company helps Canadians relocating abroad with tax matters, says that among his clients, the exodus trend is unmistakable. He cited better weather, a more favourable business climate, and the ease of settling into a country that shares the same language and a similar culture as key factors drawing many Canadians to the United States.
“Lifestyle for one, warmer weather two, similar language and culture three, and taxes are on the list, but it’s not number one,” Moody told The Epoch Times.

In terms of exactly who’s leaving, Moody said he believes it’s disproportionately wealthy Canadians, noting that his high-income clients are increasingly willing to pay departure taxes in exchange for lower long-term tax burdens in the United States.

Although detailed data are not available, he said the increasing exodus needs to be taken seriously.

“When you have credible people... who are raising the alarm bells, in my view, you should be listening; at least taking notes,” Moody said.

Mintz said he personally knows 10 multi-billionaires who have emigrated out of Canada, including to Switzerland, the Cayman Islands, and the United States.

Permanent Residents Leaving​

Moshe Lander, a senior economics lecturer at Concordia University of Montreal who resides in Calgary, told The Epoch Times that some of the debate over Canadians leaving could be caused by an “echo chamber” of those who are upset about the direction of the country and talk about leaving in a way that may inflate perception of the scale of emigration over its actual occurrence.
However, he said he’s particularly concerned that a growing number of permanent residents are giving up on the idea of becoming Canadian, and said he believes a significant amount of the departures noted by StatCan are permanent residents.
For Chervinski and her husband, Jeremy Arnal, the decision to relocate feels final.

“Some advantages we’ve experienced since deciding to leave Canada are more affordable home prices, and honestly the health-care system down here is so much quicker,” she said, noting that private health-care insurance is affordable given the higher pay levels and lower taxes.
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Upvote 11
Alberta was also the only province last year to grow in terms of interprovincial migration, experiencing a surge of more than 30,000 people moving to that province from within Canada.
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Future NDP voters ^
 
maybe? I would think its more right wing people. why come here to a UCP government?
 
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Most people move for economic reasons. Alberta has no PST and cheaper housing than the GTA. There's also opportunities in the energy sector if you want to fly up to Fort Mac every other week. It's also cleaner (for now at least, but this is changing). It's also slightly less arduous to start a business in the West, although Canada as a whole is pretty dogshit for business development. Still, Alberta has more money.
 
@brutana_dilewski I don't want to be black pilled about it but you may be right. like the fags in the US who move out to California then move to red states then vote for the shit that ruined California in the first place. See Huston in Texas.
 
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