
Canada’s tech startup sector wants easier access to hire top foreign talent - rpledge
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/canadas-tech-startup-sector-wants-easier-access-to-hire-top-foreign-talent/article29401388/?cmpid=rss1&google_editors_picks=true
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rgoldade
Swaths of Waterloo and UofT grads leave Canada for better paying work in the
USA. There is no lack of talent coming out of Canadian Universities. If they
can't keep their own domestic talent, how do they figure they can attrack "top
foreign talent"? It seems like a false flag operation to find cheaper labour.

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niuzeta
Agreed. You try to stay in Canada for love of the country(no joke. I love it
here) or just not wanting to leave familiar scene. But with insane housing
market and (relatively)low wage, the temptation is strong.

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3pt14159
Housing isn't that expensive outside of Vancouver. You can buy a one bedroom
condo a 2 min walk from the CN Tower for $230k to $260k USD / 300k to $350k
CAD, and salaries here are lower than SF or NYC, but not by that much.
Vancouver, yes, pays very poorly and has unreasonable housing prices, but that
is far from all of Canada.

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hackerboos
The housing market in Toronto is skewed.

Yes apartment prices can be considered reasonable but actual houses are
approaching the same levels as Vancouver.

Also those $250k apartments usually have $500/month maintenance fees attached.
Not all, but some.

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3pt14159
I feel like I say this all the time, but... Real houses _should_ be expensive
in a _city_. The whole point of a city is densification. I don't want to live
around a bunch of (usually detached) houses as far as the eye can see. I want
to live where everything is happening. If you want a real house with an nice
mostly quiet neighbourhood with a Canadian Tire and a Boston Pizza live in
Georgetown and take the Go Train.

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danielhooper
Canadian tech workers are underpaid and the weak dollar is making it even
worse. You can practically double your purchasing power by going over the
border and working in the states.

In my experience, finding a job here in Toronto as a
programmer/developer/engineer/whatever has been VERY tough without a CS
background (or any degree for that matter). Despite launching an app in the
app store I still struggle to get interviews for even junior level positions,
which in Toronto translates to around $50k - $60k. I could make the same
amount of money waiting tables if I really wanted to.

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drubio
"Junior level positions, which in Toronto translates to around $50k - $60k. I
could make the same amount of money waiting tables if I really wanted to."

So the going rates in Canada are in that range. I interviewed for a remote
senior position (5+ years exp) for a start-up in Toronto (that from brief
research looked to be profitable, so I went ahead).

My jaw dropped when they said they were targeting $25 (CAD) an hour, with the
exchange rate that's less than $19 (US) an hour. My sentiment was the same as
yours, at $19 (US) an hour I could make the same amount of money teaching
plain English anywhere in the world. It looks like they don't even do a cross-
check for other industry rates, just fluent English can net you the same rates
as an English teacher in practically any market.

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danielhooper
It's mostly an estimated guess. It seems your real example is more accurate.
How long ago was this?

I was recently working for a start-up in Toronto as well. They told me they
could no longer afford me after billing them only ~$10,000 CAD for two months
of work building the only product they were ever going to have. It worked out
to close to $20-$25 CAD an hour as well.

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nadeemk
I'm a foreign worker worker who graduated from a top school in Canada but now
work in Silicon Valley. Interviewing in Canada was a nightmare, I was called
back 3 times to interview more and more people for the same company, salaries
were abysmally low and I felt a general cautious vibe / old school bureaucracy
in hiring.

There are hundreds of thousands of wannabe tech immigrants stuck in the broken
US immigration process who should be prime targets for Canadian Tech
Companies. But the fact that these people would rather be abused by lifelong
delays imposed by US govt. than instantly get a Canadian Residency and
Citizenship is testament on how unattractive opportunities in Canada are.

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nish1500
I've had mixed experience in Canada. Yes, the companies here are traditional
and salaries are low, but that isn't all of the market. I have interviewed at
a few exciting companies, all of which pay good salaries. Not SV-high, but
higher than what Canada is used to.

I'd much rather take a pay cut, than spend 17 years to get residency in a
country that doesn't want me.

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jayhuang
Retaining local talent may be difficult enough as-is without even thinking
about attracting foreign talent. I'm not too familiar with the situation in
Ottawa (as seems to be the main focus of this article), but as a Vancouverite,
it's no secret that tech salaries here are lagging behind from our American
neighbours, even as close as Seattle. Despite the gap in wages, our CoL is
more or less comparable (yes yes, I'm aware of > $3k/month rentals in SF, but
unlike SF, $100k in Vancouver isn't considered low). That coupled with a
significant drop in the Canadian dollar...

Well let's just say it hurts.

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scrabble
Salaries are lagging in Waterloo as well. That's not to say they're bad or the
CoL is equal, but they are lagging.

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etblg
You want more top tech talent? Pay more. I have a pretty well paying comfy job
in Toronto and even I keep considering just jumping to the states because it
pays so much better. This is just a way of not having to pay what people are
worth while trying to get talent.

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MrDresden
Currently staying in Canada as a tourist, while working remote for a European
FinTech and have had a Express Entry application going for 6 months now. And I
can tell you that the whole system is a joke.

I have a BSc in CS, 6 years work experience in the tech sector, near perfect
score on the english language tests and I have 440 points (EE uses a point
system). I have tried everything I can think of trying to have the CiC
acknowledge that I have a job and an income (to gain more points) but to no
avail. I would be able to pay my taxes in Canada as my home country has a dual
tax agreement with Canada. However if I were to take a job flipping burgers,
through the job bank program, I would get extra 300-400 points and be allowed
to move in (in all likelyhood since the points would place me high enough to
qualify).

Again, this system is a complete joke.

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nikanj
Start working as a contractor for your employer, and you get +600 points for
having a job offer from your me.ltd contractor company.

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sterl
This is great advice, cross-check it but thanks for posting nikanj

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adomanico
The issue isn't policy, the issue is companies in Canada are not competitive
enough with their salaries.

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robert_foss
That is simply not true.

For the past 12 months I've fruitlessly tried to obtain a work permit for a
Toronto based company. The salary was quite competitive, but ultimately having
5 consecutive work permit applications fail just wasted too much time.

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serge2k
If salaries were actually competitive the job would probably have gone to a
Canadian.

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serge2k
Canada's tech sector can shut up about wanting foreign talent until they pay
enough to retain canadian talent.

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eulji
What salaries do you guys consider competitive ? Do you all compare it to the
SV salaries ?

If we exclude SV salaries how much more your avg US tech worker earns compared
to his canadian peer.

And is this concentration of wealth good for the economy overall ?

I mean the canadians experience exactly the same. Even the high paid workers
in Vancouver cannot afford housing as the "super rich" chinese that climbed
upon the backs of their fellow countrymen and then swarmed Canada.

Don't you think that such concentration of wealth is not really a good idea ?

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calm_cl
Anyone can tell me what "top foreign talent" means here?

I just thought startup companies cannot afford to hire top talented workers.

I thought top talented workers usually launch startup.. not hired.

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Devthrowaway80
I left Canada not too long ago. With the current exchange rate, my base here
in SV is 350% of what I made in Canada for a much less stressful job. When you
take the absurd RSU grant I'm getting into account, my estimated take home for
the year is going to be nearly 10x that of my total Canadian compensation. The
cost of living in SV is higher, but it is not THAT much higher.

The problem is that they just don't pay enough to compete. I'd move home in a
heartbeat, but I won't work for a decade there for what I can make in a year
here.

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canistr
I've always believed that if one of GoogleMicrosoftAmazonFacebook etc. started
opening up more major development offices in Toronto, Vancouver, Montreal (but
mainly Toronto), we would stop losing so much of our top talent to the US.

Competition would rise. And then we'd be able to create a much stronger talent
pool, higher salaries in the tech community, and overall a better ecosystem.
But none of these companies have really tapped into this system.

But it seems like no executive at these companies has figured it out yet!

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cplanas
What is there for these companies in Canada? It seems a better idea to open
development offices in other countries, that might be cheaper and have a
bigger talent pool.

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auxym
Such as? (Genuinely curious)

Canada also has the same language, can have the same time zone as any US
location, is closer (no overseas flights) and has established trade
relationships with the US.

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cplanas
EU is a clear example. And then you have China and India, that have a smaller
percentage of educated people, but have such a big populations that their
elites can be excellent.

The issue with Canada is that it's pretty small, population wise. I guess that
for those big American companies is simpler to bring the -relatively- small
number of Canadians to the US.

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caffodian
There are no shortcuts to solving brain drain. Find a compelling way to solve
it (paying more, giving more opportunities to grow is a good start) and let's
talk from there.

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golergka
Have just been thinking of moving to Canada in the next few years, because
it's immigration process seems to be friendlier to professionals without a
degree — but comments here have been discouraging, to say the least.

What's a good place to find more information about Canada's tech (gamedev in
particular) to adequately measure my chances of finding a relocation offer?

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saiprashanth93
Same here, looking to move to Canada in the near future. Any info on how long
the whole process takes and the other relevant info for web devs would be
helpful.

