Housing Crisis No Crisis

Housing is cheaper in smaller provinces. Students have always shared apartments. It's part of the fun. Foreign students cannot demand single-person accommodation. They must share like Canadians.

Headlines about a housing crisis in Canada seem to be a weekly occurrence. That’s why we should try and unpack it, look at it in context. First of all, let’s remove students from the equation. Canadian parents pay taxes in their provinces. Some of the money ends up in local colleges and universities. That’s why tuition fees for their kids are less than those paid by foreign students.

The housing crisis should not include foreign students because they knew exactly what to expect when they decided to study in Canada. They knew that they will have to find their own housing if they decide to come with the extended family. This is not only in Canada. It’s countries like U.K. Australia, France and U.S. as well. Foreign students pay for rental accommodation in their own countries, unless parents own  property. They cannot demand things they don’t have back home.

Housing Crisis in Provinces?

We should be specific about the housing crisis. Where exactly? Life is more expensive in big cities than in small towns. There’s great excitement when someone from Regina, a city in Saskatchewan province  gets a plum job in Toronto, because it comes with a plum salary. The plum becomes dried fruit when she gets there and realizes most of it goes to the rent of a tiny one-bedroom apartment. Americans who moved from smaller cities to New York or Chicago understand that scenario. 

Therefore, there is no housing crisis in big cities. It’s a matter of supply and demand, which has always been there and is likely to continue indefinitely. The magnet is jobs. That’s why rents are higher in big cities. Life in small town might be ‘boring’ but it’s cheaper and comes with a lawn and a backyard.

Nonqaba waka Msimang

Executive Blogger