The mass exodus that Toronto and Ontario as a whole experienced during the lockdown era appears to be repeating itself as people struggle with the cost of living, among other issues, in the province.

Even though there has been record population growth in Canada over the last few months, new data released by StatCan this week shows that tens of thousands of residents have left Ontario, B.C. and other provinces to flock to ... Alberta, of all places.

"All provinces and territories recorded losses in their interprovincial migration exchanges in the third quarter of 2023 except for Alberta, which continued to have the highest net gains (+17,094) and New Brunswick (+21), with a very small gain," a new population estimate report from the government agency reads.

People keep leaving Ontario for elsewhere in the country more than any other province https://t.co/4TJdNACAz7 #Ontario

— blogTO (@blogTO) June 28, 2022

This marks five straight quarters of the prairie province seeing gains of 10,000 or more newcomers who've packed up to head to the land of the Calgary stampede, the oil sands, and, of course, greater affordability, particularly for housing.

The standard home in Alberta's biggest city, Calgary, will run you about $557,400 compared to Toronto's $1,081,300. The average home price in Edmonton, the province's capital, is just $368,200 as of November 2023 — shockingly low by Ontario standards, where there has been a "continuous net loss" of interprovincial migration.

It seems that Alberta's incessant ad campaigns to get people from elsewhere in Canada to consider relocating there may have been more successful than the public — a chunk of whom mocked the ads — expected.

Alberta's push for Ontarians to move there seems to have worked as many eye property https://t.co/oqLjVSxAy2 #Ontario #Alberta

— blogTO (@blogTO) August 1, 2023

In its update, StatCan says that Canada's population grew more in the last three months than it has in any quarter since 1957, with 430,635 new people (an increase of 1.1 per cent) from July to October 2023.

By comparison, we had growth of 198,000 during that portion of '57, which marked an increase of 1.2 per cent at the time.