AB gained 14 active businesses under UCP

Earlier this week, Statistics Canada released data on active businesses in Canada, and I thought I’d go through it to see how Alberta fared.

The most recent data is November 2023, so keep that in mind.

First, here’s the number of active businesses in each province, as of November 2023.

ON	358,935
QC	201,705
BC	155,023
AB	119,823
MB	28,661
SK	24,830
NS	20,599
NB	17,374
NL	12,593
PEI	4,207

Alberta came in fourth place, which shouldn’t be that surprising given that it has the fourth highest population as well.

Now, let’s look at how that number compares to the past. First, over the previous month.

	Oct 2023	Nov 2023	Change	% change
QC	201,474	201,705	231	0.11%
NB	17,367	17,374	7	0.04%
MB	28,673	28,661	-12	-0.04%
PEI	4,227	4,207	-20	-0.47%
NL	12,663	12,593	-70	-0.55%
NS	20,672	20,599	-73	-0.35%
SK	24,924	24,830	-94	-0.38%
BC	155,138	155,023	-115	-0.07%
AB	119,947	119,823	-124	-0.10%
ON	359,672	358,935	-737	-0.20%

Between October and November 2023, all but 2 provinces saw a decrease in the number of active businesses.

Three of the four largest provinces saw the three largest decreases, with Ontario being in last place (737 lost) and Alberta having the second largest loss (124).

Alberta had the fifth smallest percentage based decrease.

Now let’s take a look at how things changed in each province over the past year.

	Nov 2022	Nov 2023	Change	% change
ON	357,448	358,935	1,487	0.42%
AB	118,540	119,823	1,283	1.08%
QC	200,708	201,705	997	0.50%
MB	28,489	28,661	172	0.60%
NB	17,340	17,374	34	0.20%
NS	20,585	20,599	14	0.07%
PEI	4,214	4,207	-7	-0.17%
NL	12,652	12,593	-59	-0.47%
SK	25,013	24,830	-183	-0.73%
BC	155,445	155,023	-422	-0.27%

Alberta gained nearly 1,300 active businesses over this 12-month period, the second largest increase the country.

British Columbia saw the largest drop in their number of active businesses drop over the last year, at over 400.

Since November 2022, the number of active businesses in Alberta increased by 1.08%, the largest increase among all provinces.

The story worsens slightly for Alberta when comparing 2 years.

	Nov 2021	Nov 2023	Change	% change
ON	348,706	358,935	10,229	2.93%
QC	197,646	201,705	4,059	2.05%
AB	117,210	119,823	2,613	2.23%
BC	153,016	155,023	2,007	1.31%
MB	28,195	28,661	466	1.65%
NS	20,241	20,599	358	1.77%
PEI	3,985	4,207	222	5.57%
NB	17,221	17,374	153	0.89%
SK	24,828	24,830	2	0.01%
NL	12,656	12,593	-63	-0.50%

Alberta’s increase of 2,613 active businesses over the last 2 years drops it to 3rd place; same with the percentage basis (2.23%).

Ontario had the largest increase of all the provinces, in terms of absolute numbers (over 10,000), while PEI saw the largest increase in percentage of new active businesses (5.57%).

Now, let’s look at active businesses over the last 3 years. Things aren’t a whole lot better for Alberta.

	Nov 2020	Nov 2023	Change	% change
ON	326,907	358,935	32,028	9.80%
QC	188,966	201,705	12,739	6.74%
BC	143,550	155,023	11,473	7.99%
AB	112,785	119,823	7,038	6.24%
MB	27,322	28,661	1,339	4.90%
NS	19,438	20,599	1,161	5.97%
SK	23,740	24,830	1,090	4.59%
NB	16,761	17,374	613	3.66%
PEI	3,835	4,207	372	9.70%
NL	12,331	12,593	262	2.12%

Alberta saw a massive increase during that 3-year period, seeing over 7,000 more active businesses. It wasn’t large enough to take them out of 3rd place, however. In fact, they dropped down one more notch, being surpassed by the 3 larger provinces.

This shouldn’t be that surprising. We’d expect the 4th largest province to have the 4th largest increase in total active businesses.

Ontario grew their active businesses by over 32,000, a 9.80% increase, compared to Alberta’s 6.24%.

Speaking of percentage increases, Alberta’s was so low, that the province drops from 4th place to 5th place.

Let’s move on to November 2019.

	Nov 2019	Nov 2023	Change	% change
ON	347,913	358,935	11,022	3.17%
QC	193,439	201,705	8,266	4.27%
BC	148,609	155,023	6,414	4.32%
MB	27,828	28,661	833	2.99%
AB	119,257	119,823	566	0.47%
NS	20,188	20,599	411	2.04%
PEI	3,976	4,207	231	5.81%
NB	17,354	17,374	20	0.12%
SK	24,957	24,830	-127	-0.51%
NL	13,167	12,593	-574	-4.36%

Ouch.

Alberta dropped another spot to end up in 5th place, surpassed by the 3 larger provinces, as well as by the smaller Manitoba. When we go back to 2019, Alberta increases only by only 566 active businesses, which tells me that the majority of the 7,038 new active businesses between 2020 and 2023 were recovery numbers, from the economic shutdown during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The ironic thing is that November 2019 was the fifth month after Alberta’s UCP government implemented their so-called Job Creation Tax Cut. When they implemented it, they claimed it would lead to tens of thousands of more jobs being created.

However, what we see is that in the 4 years since the UCP government cut the tax rate on corporate profits, Alberta had only the 5th best performance in the country, gaining only 566 active businesses, compared to over 11,000 in Ontario, over 8,000 in Québec, and over 6,000 in BC. And none of those provinces had to drop their corporate profit tax to 8%.

To make matters worse, Alberta was in second-to-last place for the percentage of active businesses gained. Alberta’s gain of 0.47% of its active businesses over the last 4 years put it ahead of only New Brunswick, on a percentage basis, when comparing provinces with increases.

To be fair, Newfoundland and Labrador, as well as Saskatchewan, lost businesses during that period, so Alberta technically did better than them, too.

Finally, here’s how things looked compared to November 2018, the last November under the NDP.

	Nov 2018	Nov 2023	Change	% change
ON	344,512	358,935	14,423	4.19%
QC	191,422	201,705	10,283	5.37%
BC	147,326	155,023	7,697	5.22%
MB	27,630	28,661	1,031	3.73%
NS	20,055	20,599	544	2.71%
PEI	3,890	4,207	317	8.15%
SK	24,814	24,830	16	0.06%
AB	119,809	119,823	14	0.01%
NB	17,404	17,374	-30	-0.17%
NL	13,481	12,593	-888	-6.59%

Alberta still had the worst performance of all the provinces in Canada that saw increases, gaining only 14 active businesses. Only 2 other provinces saw losses, which puts Alberta in 8th place out of all 10 provinces.

Here’s another look at the numbers over the last 5 years.

You can see the huge drop in active businesses in the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Another thing this chart clearly shows is that any growth in active businesses that has occurred during the UCP administration has been almost entirely recovery growth.

Plus, the number of active businesses was already declining for months before the pandemic-fuelled recession kicked in.

In fact, between November 2018 and February 2020, the last month before the government implemented public health protections, the province had already lost nearly 1,500 active businesses.

All of the losses over the last 5 years were small businesses with fewer than 5 employees. There was a net loss of 405 active businesses with under 100 employees.

	Nov 2018	Nov 2023	Change
1–4	79,587	77,585	-2,002
5–19	28,392	29,453	1,061
20–99	9,849	10,385	536
100–499	1,760	1,869	109
500+	349	349	0