
Ask HN: Has anyone moved to Canada? - marrone12
Hi, my girlfriend is a Canadian citizen and eventually wants to move back. I work as a data scientist manager in tech and make good money. How have people found the move to Canada in terms of salary, opportunity, and interesting companies to work for compared to American non-Bay Area tech cities like NYC, Seattle etc.<p>My initial searches have found it to be relatively barren, but maybe I&#x27;m looking in the wrong places? Thinking primarily Vancouver but potentially open to other cities.<p>Thank you.
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kat
My advice for Vancouver: \- Tech Jobs: look on craigslist (surprisingly good!)

\- Salaries: Look on glassdoor. Also look on the CRA website (CRA is the IRS
in Canada) to see which tax bracket you'll be in - you'll notice lower
salaries and higher taxes, as many people have already pointed out

\- Interesting Companies: Lots! Microsoft, Amazon, Hootsuite, and more. There
is an increasing number of big tech companies that have figure out its cheaper
to have a Canadian office than an American office. There are less tech jobs
but there are also less tech people - It sounds like you have a niche
background, so it might take a little longer to find a job.

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ajeet_dhaliwal
I’m in a similar position except I’m currently in London, UK. Wife would love
move to Toronto where she grew up and has family but some issues stop us. Even
in Toronto, a bigger place than Vancouver things feel _relatively barren_ as
you put it, salaries are lower. If you have an online business or work
remotely that can solve things but beware high taxes. To take just one example
currently Ontario’s highest rate of marginal income tax is 53.4% compared with
45% in the U.K. That said taxes are complex as a whole, not all taxes are
higher but overall the burden in Ontario tends to be higher and applies at
lower levels. Some of the salaries they pay government workers are very high
compared to elsewhere.

My wife’s family loves living in Canada and we may yet move one day but I’d
say if you’re from the US, UK or Asia I would not feel bad about it taking
much longer to find work in Canada, I don’t think you’re doing anything wrong
or looking in the wrong places.

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tchadwick
I'm Canadian. I moved to LA for a bit and then moved back to my home in
Saskatchewan. I took a bit of a pay cut to come back, but I work for an
autonomous vehicle company now. I enjoy it much more than my job in LA. We're
looking for a Deep Learning/Data Scientist right now ;) $70-150k CAD is what
to expect for salary range.

It definitely is harder to find interesting companies in Canada, which is why
I originally left. They do exist though! Most decently sized cities are
actively building startup & tech communities.

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aprdm
I moved from London - UK to Vancouver and love it.

Perfect mix of a big / small city .

Tech salaries are higher than London for staff salary people and smaller than
US which is just across the border.

Cost of life is expensive but for tech workers is OK. Better than London for
sure.

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hackermailman
Try and work remotely out of the US, salaries here (Vancouver) are shit once
you factor in taxes and cost of living.

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thiagooffm
Maybe consider saving enough money in order to buy a property over there
before moving, that will greatly help you. Other than that, just move there.

If you do that, your cost of living will be lower and in Canada you will have
access to good healthcare, education and maybe to enjoy things again which
doesn't imply monetary property. I'm pretty sure that overall, you'll have
happier and more educated kids. I can imagine the kind of monsters people grow
in the USA.

I live in Germany and we have many points like Canada and I just laugh when I
hear about "could make more money elsewhere" or "career" in America when life
is much softer and nicer here. Sure, things aren't perfect here, but at least
people in general care about the environment and the personal space of others,
I can easily get a lot of vegetarian/vegan food in Berlin and people are just
awesome, many of them, from the US and sick of the state of art country you've
got there. If you don't care about this and is a psycho which just want to
maximize how much you make and then die, just stay in the US. It is a good
place for you to be.

If I had the chance to pick living in the USA or in a first developed country,
somewhat decent living conditions and economy. I would definitely pick the
second choice.

I seriously wouldn't feel like living in a the same country of Trump, or just
the average american mindset. It just looks pretty retarded to me. It's a
economy that only exists because it manages to really impose its power around
the world, so americans there feel like they got something, but it's always in
exchange of somebodys life or happiness. I'm not sure if I would like to tell
my kids I'm this kind of person, or my family. I wouldn't feel happy for
myself.

But that's just me. Make your choice, but remember, life isn't your salary or
your job position.

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gota
Huh, kinda harsh there on your judgement of the way of life of 300+ million
people, most of whom don't actively seek it or have any reasonable say in it

Still, giving you the benefit of interpreting your point as friendly as I can,
I can't help but state that _your_ economical advantage there on one of the
richest countries in the world _also_ only exists because it is imposed on
others around the world

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thiago_fm
Never said that here is perfect. The supposition is the following:

\- He can move somewhere if he wants(he got the choice, unlike many). \-
Country is bad, creates a bad impact in the world than the other country. Also
can enjoy as a individual a better quality of life. \- Why stay?

I travel frequently to the US(lately, roughly every year) and that is my
observation. Every year I go, my typical restaurants look more cheap and the
people more decadent and I'm quite young, so I saw that change since I visited
it for the first time, around 20 years ago.

I find it very hard to believe that anything about the american way of doing
things(let it be culture or business) is sustainable. The US will probably
undergo in some crisis and change, but I wouldn't like to be exactly there and
experience it :-)

I was born in a third-world country and at least recently, I've been quite
amused at how many things my country started to do much better than the US and
some areas look as good as they do in the US, meanwhile I haven't seen
anything getting better in the last decade... Have you tried using a bank in
the US?

I bet that there is a country in Africa that has a better and faster banking
system than in the US.

Maybe if you share another opinion, you could share it as well.

~~~
gota
Are you sure this was meant as a reply to my comment? It is way too ranty and
so beyond the point of what I wrote that I believe you answered to the wrong
post

