[Slava]

Originally Posted by Puckbag

I've seen the same argument said about agriculture, forestry, mining, etc about how little these industries provide the the economic GDP and I do not agree with this premise.

In my opinion, % GDP of an economy can be a bit misleading as most primary industries do no make up a big portion of the total GDP in a nation. However you remove primary industries such as oil and gas, agriculture, mining, forestry, etc. from an area (lets say Alberta in this example), there is very little secondary or tertiary industries (which make up the majority of GDP) that will follow. There would be no reason for people to move to Alberta in the early 20th century to help build this economy to what it is today.

The real estate industry contributes the most to the Canadian GDP, however it would not provide near the amount it does to the GDP if there are no resources to bring people in to an area to start with. The wealth generated from the primary industries are the main reason why the service industry exists, if Alberta (Or Canada for that matter) had no natural resources whatsoever, this province would be a figment of what it is now.

So yes, I would say primary industries as a whole pay the rent in this country, even though GDP percentage wise, may not look like very much. I hope I made sense to everyone here, I'm no where near as articulated as some posters here on this forum, its a skill I wish I had.

It’s exactly this. GDP isn’t a good measure of the impact because it’s all the spin-offs and other sectors that gain because we have an oil and gas industry. Look no further than the service sector. It’s as large as it is in Calgary because we have the other industry, not the other way around.