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January 24, 2020HEAD OFFICES IN CANADA, 2018 Statistics Canada reports on the number of and employment in head office locations across Canada. Head offices include establishments and locations primarily engaged in providing management and/or administrative support services to affiliated establishments. They activities include corporate functions such as strategic organizational planning, communications, tax planning, legal services, marketing, finance, human resource management and information technology services.
The number of head offices in Canada has increased slightly in 2018 to 2,737 from (2,729 in 2017). Of these, the largest number are found in Canada's larger urban provinces - Ontario, Quebec, British Columbia and Alberta. In particular, these head offices are more concentrated in larger cities.
There are fewer head office locations in the Atlantic provinces as well as in Manitoba and Saskatchewan. Nova Scotia's head office count was 70 in 2018, the same level as was reported in 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017. Since 2012, there has been stability or small declines in the number of head offices in most provinces.
The number of head office employees was up slightly in 2018 to 228,291 in Canada. Nova Scotia accounted for 2,631 of these employees. As with locations, larger urban provinces (and the larger urban centres within them) account for the bulk of head office employment in Canada.
Note: totals for head office employment and locations in Quebec and Ontario include the Ottawa/Gatineau area that straddles the border between these provinces. There were 67 head office locations in Ottawa/Gatineau in 2018 with 7,599 head office employees.
Larger and more urban provinces also report more head office employees per location - reaching as high as 138.0 per location in Calgary. British Columbia is the exception to this, with an average of only 59.2 head office employees per location. Nova Scotia's head office locations report an average of 37.6 head office employees each - only Newfoundland and Labrador, Prince Edward Island and the Territories report fewer head office employees per location.
Over 2012-2018, Head Office employment in Nova Scotia peaked in 2014 and then declined in the past four years. Since 2012 head office employment in Canada has grown with increases in six provinces and territories and decrease observed in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Saskatchewan and Alberta.
Source: Statistics Canada, Table: 33-10-0110-01
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