But also: yes, Canada is big. Canada will also kill you real good and hard in most places. There’s a tremendous amount of land, and a lot of it is very very cold, and you really, really don’t want to live there.
Yakutsk pop. 311,760
Omsk pop. 1,172,070
Harbin pop. 6,976,136
The maritimes are sparsely populated and have even milder weather.
If the will were there to build the necessary road and rail infrastructure, Canada could support a much, much larger population.
bollocks, it's plenty cold
> accessibility
...is a function of, among other things, weather. much of geography is also very problematic; huge portions of the country are marshes that are dicey to build on, while other parts are mountains, and often in rain-shadows
> maritimes
...don't have any jobs. the fisheries are dying and climate change is driving that, on top of excess demand collapsing fish populations. the offshore oil platforms are dead too; those guys became Alberta roughnecks.
What service companies there are in CAN have followed suit with the US and demanded all of their workers go back to the office.
Yeah it's sparse but there are no jobs and no ability to move there -- non-starter of an idea. And "milder" weather is still quite cold by most of the world standards.