Canada’s Demographic Time Bomb: What Boom, Bust & Echo Got Right

Video Description

Canada’s housing crisis. Youth unemployment. Immigration debates. A broken healthcare system. What if we told you a book published in 1996 predicted almost all of it? In this episode of The Missing Middle, Cara Stern and Mike Moffatt revisit the Canadian classic Boom, Bust & Echo to explore how demographics, especially the aging of the Baby Boomers, reshaped Canada’s economy, housing market, job prospects, and public policy. We break down: • Why youth unemployment was a policy choice • How demographics quietly drive housing prices • What governments got right — and very wrong • Why immigration policy, real estate, and healthcare are deeply connected • And how Canada ended up with a generational economic imbalance This isn’t just history. It explains why life is harder for young Canadians today and what choices led us here. If you care about housing affordability, jobs, immigration, public policy, and Canada’s economic future, this episode is for you. 👇 Drop your thoughts in the comments. Did policymakers ignore the warnings? Chapters: 00:00 Introduction 00:49 Why Boom, Bust, and Echo (BBE) still matters 03:00 What the book got right and wrong 04:25 Prediction about the rise of home health care 06: 06 Policy dilemma: high demand for PSWs & balancing budgets 08:12 Immigration policy advice from Boom, Bust and Echo 09:03 Governments didn’t take the advice 10:55 BBE real estate prediction 11:45 Housing market predictions: what went wrong 15:10 Boomers, Millennials & real estate 16:40 BBE prediction on future changes to taxation policy 17:13 The politics of moving taxation from income to capital 19:50 Real estate prediction for aging boomers 20:34 Naturally occurring retirement communities 23:40 Following where people actually live 24:47 Demographics are facts that help us understand the future Research/links: Boom, Bust & Echo: How to Profit from the Coming Demographic Shift https://www.amazon.ca/Boom-bust-echo-profit-demographic/dp/0921912978 David Foot on Aging Society & Youth https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gy7y2w9i_aA What David Foot didn't tell us https://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/what-david-foot-didnt-tell-us/article784233/ Finding Naturally Occurring Retirement Communities - Agenda segment https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ynlwpsye2c0 Credits: Credits: Mike Moffatt https://twitter.com/MikePMoffatt https://bsky.app/profile/mikepmoffatt.bsky.social Meredith Martin https://twitter.com/meredithmartin https://bsky.app/profile/meredithmartin.bsky.social Sean Foreman @seanegertonforeman https://bsky.app/profile/seanforeman.bsky.social Cara Stern https://x.com/carastern https://bsky.app/profile/carastern.bsky.social Co-op Student Dylan Dayaratne Brought to you by the Missing Middle Initiative https://www.missingmiddleinitiative.ca/