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Homebuilding costs in Canada soar 51% as population surges
(financialpost.com)
What's going on Canada?
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Immigrants, or temporary foreign workers.
We'll need more houses for that, of course, but obviously construction workers build more houses than they live in.
The article doesn't even talk about labour costs, it exclusively refers to the increased materials costs.
I admit I just skimmed it, but a worker shortage actually is mentioned.
Yeah, material shortages are harder, but they're kind of a short term thing due to plant shutdowns and forestry disruptions. I wonder how forestry is going to adapt as the tree line moves north.
Here in BC, record forest fires year after year are certainly having an impact, although the mountain pine beetle fallout is finally also coming to fruition.
It was open season on beetle killed timber for over a decade, creating a glut of timber supply. It's just going to go to waste anyways (up in smoke a fair amount as well). I think most of that beetle kill is done with now, or at least the easier logged stuff.
If we kept up on replanting, it usually takes 20-40 years for most of the tree species harvested in BC to mature, so those replanted trees wouldn't be mature for another 10+ years anyways. Now throw in the heat dome, droughts, etc. and it just gets more fun (and fiery).
I'm not a forester or silviculturist, and I'm not on the logging side of the business, but my impression is that there just isn't going to be as much cheap lumber available in BC, potentially ever. I would chalk a large part of this to global warming, right from the original pine beetle infestation. This means that the underlying problem is bigger than the government of BC can fix on it's own, but I would have hoped to see more vigour in a push for climate action from the people of BC, specifically those whose forest industry jobs are threatened.
Not 20-40 years in BC, but 80-120 years. Good news is that the lands harvested in the 60s and 70s will start to mature in 20 years. But we're going to have a shortfall until then.