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PaperclipPerfector  11mo ago (text post)   27875 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of November 27, 2023

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This is not really a cynical take, it is what our officials out-and-out say: the purpose for immigration is cheap labour and keeping up housing prices.

Building new cities does not work towards those goals. Shoving 500k new people every year into the GTA does.

Which Canadian officials say that the purpose of immigration is keeping up housing prices?

It's usually framed using words like "resilience and strength" or "vibrant". The leading newspapers regularly feature columns from or interviewing people with incentives to encourage immigration with little critical analysis applied. Here's an example. Great emphasis is placed on the importance of housing prices continuing to rise in perpetuity.

I think you got over your skis here. The first link is just a factual report about prices rising and doesn't seem to mention immigration. The second is essentially a realtor's opinion (no surprise that realtors are in favor of continued scarcity). The third and fourth get closer but I still don't see any officials out and out saying that the purpose of immigration is to keep housing prices high.

I do agree that the third and fourth articles curiously assume that high housing costs are a good thing in a way that I haven't seen in American media though.

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