Ottawa is 2900 square kilometres and the expansion, if it is approved, the expansion of the urban boundary is 1650 hectares (~16.5 square kilometres), causing great debate among the city council, we are going to focus on intensification, urban expansion, and housing...
Housing Affordability
A Look at Demographia’s Latest Housing Affordability Survey
Hites Ahir: You recently released the 16th Annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey: 2020. Tell us about the housing affordability measure used in the survey. Wendell Cox: Demographia uses the “median multiple,” which is the median house price...
Canada’s Resurgent Population Growth and Exodus from Unaffordability
Canada is experiencing resurgent growth, according to the latest population estimates from Statistics Canada. Between 2015 and 2019, the nation added 1.30 percent to its population annually. This is up about one-third from the annual rate between 2010 and 2015. The...
Standard of Living Crisis Evident in New Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey
One of the principal advances of the past two centuries has been the drastic reduction in poverty and the rise of a large middle-class, a process expertly detailed by economists Diedre McClosky and Robert Gordon. At the heart of this trend was the increase in the home...
Featured News
Promote Equity by Providing a Quality Education
Earlier this year, a group called Equity Matters asked the province to establish an education equity secretariat. They want this office to oversee equity officers working in Manitoba schools. Equity Matters wants to ensure that all Manitoba students are reflected in...
Why Frances Widdowson Matters
Frances Widdowson probably isn't someone most Canadians recognize. I'm here to tell you why they should. In terms of Canada's intellectual culture, Frances Widdowson matters because she is a classic and prolific academic. In a time when demagoguery easily flourishes,...
Toward More Prosperous Cities: Cities should fight poverty, not increase it
Beyond the rule of law and security, the most important public policy objectives should be to achieve wide-spread affluence and eradicate poverty. Cities, urban policy, and urban transport are means to facilitate this objective, not ends themselves.
Sydney to Abandon Radical Urban Containment Policy
The New South Wales government has proposed a new Metropolitan Strategy for the Sydney area which would significantly weaken the urban containment policy (also called urban consolidation, smart growth, livability, growth management, densification, etc.) that has driven if house prices to among the highest in the affluent New World (Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States) relative to household incomes.
170,000 New Homes for Sydney
The largest release of housing lots in 20 years will bring home ownership within reach for thousands of young families, the state government says. Up to 171,000 new homes will be built across 31 new and existing suburbs, alongside land for new jobs, shops, schools and transport.
University of Regina Economist says Rent Control Policies Bad Idea
A Regina economist is cautioning that recent calls for rent control legislation is not the best way to deal with the availability of affordable rental units.
Report Calling Sask. Unaffordable Got it All Wrong
Frontier Senior Fellow Wendell Cox explains how the article “Report Calling Sask. Unaffordable Got it All Wrong” from the Saskatoon StarPhoenix confuses statistics to reach a mistaken conclusion.
CBRM Sinks Lower in Think-Tank Survey
The Frontier Centre for Public Policy on Monday released the sixth annual edition of its local government performance index, which the CBRM has been a part of since the index’s first year in 2008.
New Report Propels Regina to Third Place
The City of Regina, by comparison, climbed nine spots over last year to tie for third with Maple Ridge, B.C., in the Frontier Centre for Public Policy’s annual Local Government Performance Index released Monday.
Is Saskatchewan’s First-Time Home Buyers Tax Credit undermining housing affordability?
On its face, the First-Time Home Buyers Tax Credit seems like it would increase housing affordability. After all, aspiring home owners often have difficulty scraping together enough money for a deposit. But tax credits are the wrong tool. I pointed out during the last provincial election that evidence from the US suggests that the tax credit would, in fact, reduce housing affordability.
Media Release – Frontier Centre Releases 9th Annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey: Canadian housing affordability slowly declining
The 9th Annual Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey was released by the Frontier Centre today. The survey encompasses 337 metro areas in the English speaking world, including 35 in Canada. Canadian housing affordability decreased slightly in 2012, despite decreases in unaffordability in several BC markets, including Vancouver.