Author Description

The overall growth of government-owned infrastructure has been very similar across most regions over the past 44 years. With the exception of the Atlantic Provinces, the range of average annual capital growth from one region to the next has been very narrow, falling between 1.8% and 2.2% since 1961, according to a new study released in September 2007 in the Canadian Economic Observer. Since 2000, governments have increased their infrastructure capital more than at any time since the 1960s and 1970s. However, the growth has not been strong enough to prevent more and more signs of wear in our infrastructure (the data are net of depreciation and in constant 1997 dollars). This is due to cuts in the 1990s when governments were grappling with significant budgetary deficits, as well as many of the assets built in the post-war infrastructure boom reaching the end of their life span. This study analyses, from 1961 to 2005, government investment in infrastructure by different levels of government and type of asset by region.