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OTTAWA — Maybe “dead money” is a bit of a misnomer. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say that cash reserves of Canadian corporations are merely “sleeping” — and growing — until there is a louder economic wakeup call.

Statistics Canada said Thursday that private non-financial corporations increased their cash holdings to $630-billion in the first quarter of this year — up from $621-billion at the end of 2013.

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“It would be nice if we could wake it up and get it invested in the economy,” said economist Erin Weir, at the United Steelworkers union.

“This accumulation of ‘dead money’ helps explain the lack of business investment despite record corporate profits.”

Corporations have been singled out by the Bank of Canada for not contributing more to the economic recovery, which has relied heavily on consumer spending for growth since the 2008-09 recession.

It has been nearly two years since Mark Carney, Canada’s central bank chief until his departure last June to head the Bank of England, ruffled corporate feathers by publicly uttering the phrase “dead money” to describe money sitting idle on balance sheets.