This is a misleading article.
More than two years into the pandemic, Canadians’ wallets are still stuffed with cash.
There is currently about $113-billion worth of physical money in circulation in Canada, up by nearly 25 per cent from pre-pandemic levels. As a share of the overall economy, that’s more cash floating around than at any time since the early 1960s.
One problem with this article is that the amount of physical cash has continually been increasing since 1990, but during Covid-19, the rate of growth has accelerated, but not to a ridiculous degree:
This number has increased by around $25 billion during the Covid panic (measured from March 2020). A more “ambient” year-to-year change is around $7-8 billion in supply, which means that about $10 billion in cash was created as a result of the Covid panic. A large amount of money, yes, but nothing compared to the overall monetary base.
What the article should be focused on is the creation of credit during Covid-19, and you can view some evidence of this by examining the monetary aggregates as compiled by the Bank of Canada (I suggest looking at the unadjusted M2++). Needless to say, in our formerly zero-interest rate environment, credit creation has skyrocketed!