Figure 3
Observed (1921 to 2008) and projected (2009 to 2061) number of births and deaths in Canada

Figure 3 shows the observed number of births and deaths from 1921 to 2008 and the projected number of births and deaths for 2009 to 2061. The first curve shows the number of deaths. The number of deaths went up over the whole reference period, from 104,531 in 1921 to 238,617 in 2008. It goes up at increasing speed from the start of the projection period to the mid-2030s, before slowing down again. The number of deaths then peaks around 487,000 at the end of the projected period. The second curve shows the number of births. The number of births went down slightly from 241,167 in 1921 to 232,750 in 1926 before it went up rapidly to reach a peak at 463,378 in 1960. The number of births then went down rapidly to reach a trough at 331,467 in 1973. It then went up to 402,533 births in 1991, before it went down again to 327,882 in 2000, and finally up again, finishing at 377,886 at the end of the reference period, in 2008. The increase in the number of births slows down in the middle of the projection period, before speeding up again. Therefore, the number of births will go from 390,600 in 2009 to 526,500 in 2060. The difference between the number of births and deaths decreased slightly from 136,636 in 1921 to reach a trough of 102,216 in 1937 before increasing again to 323,838 in 1961 and then decreased again. The difference between the number of births and deaths is 139,269 at the end of the observed period in 2008 and of 39,600 at the end of the projected period in 2060, a slight increase from the trough of 28,800 reached in 2052 and 2053.