The Canadian Press

The recession as experienced by individual Canadians has been significantly longer and worse than the official record indicates, says a new report.

An analysis by Toronto-based Dale Orr Economic Insight found that Canada’s economy has been on a downward spiral since 2007, not just since the fall of 2008 when the economy began contracting.

That’s because once population growth is taken out of the calculation of the size of the economy, per capital gross domestic product has been contracting since the beginning of 2008.

Orr said Tuesday a truer measure of both the economy and how it is experienced by Canadians is real gross domestic product per capita. By that measure, Canadian standard of living fell both in 2008 and 2009 by a total of 4.3%, or about one% more than the peak-to-trough drop in real GDP during the recession.

“From an individual’s point of view, what really matters to them is not ‘Is the economy growing?’ but ‘Is the economy growing enough so that there’s more goods and services per person?’ ”

Because Canada’s population has been growing at about 1.1% per year, Orr says Canadians’ standard of living fell slightly in 2008, when real GDP advanced 0.4%, and tumbled this year by an estimated 3.5%.

Individuals living in the larger provinces, with the exception of Quebec, have fared even worse.

The report estimates Albertans’ standard of living has fallen 6.2% since 2007, followed by Ontarians’ by 5.8% and residents of British Columbia, which saw their per capita GDP decline 5.3%.

Quebecers have gotten off relatively easy with a fall-off of 2.3%, largely because its manufacturers are focused on the aerospace sector, which has performed relatively well during the slump.

Orr said he compared his analysis on per capita GDP with another real-life measure, unemployment, and found an almost exact correlation. Ontario, Alberta and B.C. each had higher than average job losses, while Quebec’s were below the national average.

A separate report from Statistics Canada released Tuesday also appears to coincide with Orr’s findings.

The StatsCan release on Canadians collecting employment insurance shows the number of laid-off workers on benefits soared 7.1% in September to 818,000, with Ontario, Quebec and B.C. leading the way.

In the past year, the number of workers collected EI jumped by 322% in Alberta, 131% in B.C. and 83% in Ontario, all well above the 67% increase that has occurred nationally.