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Happy New Year, friends.

Every year teaches you something. 2025 taught us that Canada is on the brink of something great—the kind of moment where we either make it or break it.

Here's what stuck with us:

1. We got a new Prime Minister (and almost didn't see it coming). Justin Trudeau stepped down in January after nearly 10 years. Mark Carney—former central banker, crisis manager—took over and led the Liberals to an election win in April that almost nobody predicted. The polls said the Conservatives would sweep. Then Trump started making "51st state" jokes, and suddenly Canada was proud again. Turns out, nothing unites us like someone from the outside telling us we're not a real country.

2. We remembered we're Canadian (because someone told us we're not). Trump's "51st state" jokes and tariff threats did something unexpected: they reminded us who we are. For decades, we'd been complacently comfortable — 75% of our exports went south, we didn't build things when we could just buy American, we treated our relationship with the U.S. like it was guaranteed.

Suddenly, "Buy Canadian" became thing. People started checking labels. Businesses started sourcing locally. Nation-building projects that had been stuck in committee for years got fast-tracked. We started looking to Europe and Asia not out of fear, but out of strategy.

The pressure forced us to stop outsourcing our economic security to someone else's whims and start asking: what can we build here that we've been importing? It wasn't voluntary. But maybe that's what we needed — a reminder that being Canadian means something, and that we're better off building our own capabilities than waiting for someone else to decide our worth.

3. Rent actually dropped (and nobody knew what to do). For years, the housing conversation was one direction: up. Then in 2025, rent started falling across Canada. National average rent dropped 4.8% year-over-year — the lowest since 2023. Toronto led the decline, with one-bedroom rents down 5-8% depending on when you looked. Vancouver, Calgary, and other major cities followed.

The shift came from slowing immigration (new caps on international students), a surge in new rental supply, and economic uncertainty keeping people doubled up with roommates or moving back home. It wasn't a solution to the housing crisis, but it was the first crack in a system that felt permanent. Whether it lasts into 2026 or was just a temporary cooldown remains to be seen.

4. We closed the door to immigration ( a little). After years of record immigration, Canada pumped the brakes in 2025. New caps on international students. Reduced immigration targets overall. Ontario alone saw 15,279 fewer immigrants in the first half of the year compared to 2024.

The impact was immediate: apart from falling rent, university towns felt quieter. The job market shifted. It wasn't a full stop — just a recalibration after years of unprecedented growth. But it raised questions about who we are as a country. Are we still the place that says "come build a life here"? Or are we reassessing what growth actually costs — and whether our infrastructure can handle it?

The debate will continue into 2026. But 2025 was the year we acknowledged we can't keep growing at this pace without a thoughtful plan.

5. Workers walked off the job (and kept walking). Canada Post. Air Canada. WestJet. Railway workers. Port workers. BC public servants. 2025 was the year strikes dominated headlines — and workers stopped backing down. Flight attendants at Air Canada defied a federal back-to-work order and stayed on picket lines. WestJet mechanics walked out over Canada Day weekend. The Canada Post strike dragged through the holidays. After years of stagnant wages and rising costs, workers demanded more. And when the government tried to force them back, many refused. It exposed something fragile in how we operate — and suggested 2026 might see even more labor unrest.

6. AI stopped being a tool and became the infrastructure. 2025 was the year AI went from "future tech" to just... everywhere. Students used it for assignments. Companies used it to write reports. News outlets used it to generate articles and summarize breaking stories. Parents asked it for meal plans during the grocery crisis. People with mental health struggles leaned on it while wait times for real support stretched into months.

It was Canada's most-searched news topic of the year, but we didn't debate it — we just quietly wove it into everything and moved on. The hard questions about what's real, who wrote what, and which jobs disappear next got pushed to later. For now, we're all just using it and hoping someone else figures out the ethics.

7. The sky turned orange (again). 2025 was Canada's second-worst wildfire season on record. 8.9 million hectares burned. 85,000 people were forced from their homes — 60% of them from First Nations communities. Smoke from Western Canada turned skies orange in Toronto. Ashcroft, BC hit 40.8°C in September, breaking records. By the end of the season, 85% of the country was experiencing drought.

It followed 2023's worst-ever wildfire season, and it’s become clear: this isn't an anomaly anymore. It's the new baseline. Longer fire seasons, hotter temperatures, drier conditions. The kind of summer where you check air quality before you go outside. The kind of year where "climate change" stopped being abstract and became the smoke in your lungs.

What we're looking for in 2026:

More investment in what we can build here. Stronger Canadian businesses, more support for founders who are trying to scale without moving to Silicon Valley, infrastructure that actually works. Defence spending that reflects the world we live in, not the one we hoped for.

2025 forced us to ask: can we actually stand on our own?

The answer is maybe. But only if we commit to it. Only if we stop treating "Made in Canada" as a nice-to-have and start treating it as essential. Only if we invest in the industries, the talent, and the capacity that turn a resource-rich country into an actual power.

We've got the land, the resources, the people, and the proximity to every major market. 2026 could be the year we stop asking for permission and start building like we mean it.

Thanks for being here. Let's make 2026 count.

— Anastasia and Anna

P.S. - We've rebranded. Less career-only, more life-in-Canada. Expect more stories, more local intel, more things you'd actually talk about over coffee. First new newsletter drops next week.

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