
U.S. immigration policy has been a boon for the tech industry in Canada - md8
https://www.npr.org/2020/01/27/799402801/canada-wins-u-s-loses-in-global-fight-for-high-tech-workers?sc=18&f=1001
======
Phanyxx
Vancouverite here. When major tech companies started setting up satellite
offices here, I assumed it'd be a temporary situation, and that we'd be at the
mercy of any change in the U.S. immigration process. The longer there's an
immigration bottleneck though, the more entrenched these companies become
here. There are more senior roles opening up here all the time, and salaries
are increasing in this competitive market.

From my experience on the media / marketing side of things, a lot of people
moving here that didn't consider the U.S. as an option. For some roles, our
entire crop of interviewees have moved to Canada from other countries.

Yes, the U.S. immigration situation is helping the Canadian tech scene, but
cities like Vancouver and Toronto are more than a mere crashpad for people
waiting to move to SV. There's real momentum here as well.

~~~
jbarham
I've also lived in Toronto and Vancouver. Did the obligatory move to work as a
software dev in California and now live in Australia. The fact is that tech
salaries in Canada are still much lower than the US while the cost of living,
especially housing, is still very high, for Vancouver and Toronto in
particular. Not to mention the lousy winters.

Spend any time browsing /r/vancouver or /r/toronto and you'll quickly realize
that the cost of living is a huge problem. The Vancouver housing market in
particular has been absurdly inflated by out of control money laundering.
Local salaries and house prices are totally out of whack.

Follow [https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/](https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/) to
see what money laundering has done to the Vancouver housing market.
[https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/status/1221315000897163264](https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/status/1221315000897163264)
is a particularly amusing recent thread showing where a would-be landlord
writes: "This home is in rough shape and needs painting, and TLC. Looking for
long term tenant willing to put labour in while landlord covers all material
costs." All this for only $5650/month!

~~~
thisisnico
I'm a tech worker in Canada and can agree that the tech salaries are nowhere
close to the US. Housing is pretty high as well. The better paying jobs are in
government.

~~~
dmurdoch
I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'd like some numbers to back up the
government comment. I live in Ottawa, my SO works for government as does many
many friends. I make more then all of them. If you speak french, then maybe
this is true as you can move up to director etc. but the VAST majority of the
people I know in government do not make more than devs I know.

~~~
blaser-waffle
I'm a USA-ian in Canada, working remotely. I'm in a big Canadian city, we have
a hockey team.

The average IT salaries where I live are in the ballpark of 70-100k Canadian
Dollars (CAD) -- at least according to Indeed.ca, LinkedIn, and Glassdoor.
Given a 20-30% currency difference that's capping out at around $80K US
Dollars (USD). Not terrible by US national standards, but not impressive for
tech; i.e EMC offered me $66k USD out of college in 2008.

Meanwhile, on Reddit's r/networking, or r/sysadmin, where they have periodic
salary surveys, network engineers in NoVA or Chicago are pulling $105k-115 USD
with only 5 years experience and a CCNA -- and that's just an average, you can
often do way better.

In Calgary the highest salaries were related to oil companies, and for tech
they seemed to cap out at around $150K CAD for SCADA devs, instrumentation
specialists, etc. I'm sure there are higher paying gigs available, but you're
getting into specialized, only-found-by-word-of-mouth roles.

I've been lucky to be remote for the past 5 years, working for US firms, but
if I wasn't it would probably be close to a 50% pay cut, on top of a higher
cost of living. The COL wouldn't shock someone from NoVA or Seattle or Chicago
but it's higher than you'd think.

Re: Ottawa -- I'd assume that, like Washington DC, the government contracting
and federal bureaucracy are effectively their own mini employment universe
that plays by their own rules, and doesn't reflect the rest of the country
(e.g. security clearances mean your job can't be outsourced to India). Source:
am from DC originally.

~~~
jrs95
Yeah that doesn’t seem great I make 25% more than that with 5 years experience
and no degree in the Midwest. Salaries here have risen so a large number of
mid level people are making 6 figures. Even at some banks and
retail/e-commerce companies that are a lot more corporate and old school.

------
thawaway1837
The drop from 92% to 75% isn’t the complete story, or even the more important
story.

The real problem is all the other nonsense people have to deal with.

We have a really great employee who single handedly wrote most of the
company’s build infrastructure, and was happy in the US on his H1B because
while it requires renewal every 3 years, he was well paid and enjoying his
life.

Until about a year and a half ago when he went back to renew his visa in India
but didn’t get an approval for about 6 months. The approval process required
the company to submit the salaries of the entire 15000+ global employees from
the janitors to the CEO.

Once his visa was approved, he packed his bags and moved to Toronto within a
couple of months. And our company has stopped hiring more tech workers in the
US because they don’t want to have to deal with this anymore.

~~~
zerr
Why your company and employee didn't start H1B to green card conversion
process?

~~~
jandrese
Green cards are a joke. For some countries they are effectively impossible to
get in your lifetime. That's why we have this H1B nonsense in the first place.

~~~
unishark
Depends how you look at it. The countries with the longest waits are the very
ones who get the most green cards. Even if everyone from India was allowed to
move to the front of the line, we'd simply end up with a very long wait for
everyone.

~~~
what_ever
It's an employment based GC not diversity based. The primary criteria should
be how good the person is as an employee and not where they were born.

~~~
unishark
You mean if the govt could somehow assess quality? That would be nice if you
have a good idea how to do that. But companies have two priorities: one is a
high skill level and the other is lower pay.

If we simply removed country caps from the current system then it would be
dominated by certain countries with the highest pay difference. The smartest
scientist in Germany would be waiting in line behind hundreds of thousands of
far-less-skilled programmers from developing countries willing to work for at-
or-below market rates (in a hot market where salaries would otherwise be
rising faster).

~~~
what_ever
A lot of countries have moved towards points based system. It deals with your
level of education, level of experience, salaries etc. That could be a good
start. And docking points based on where they were born should not be part of
that.

Also, smartest scientist will still get the priority via EB1 instead of lowly
engineers who will get the EB3 category. This is already accounted for in the
current system. so we are really talking about two lowly engineers in Germany
vs India. Do you agree they should have to wait for same amount of years for
employment based GC? How about two scientists from China and tiny country of
Monaco?

~~~
unishark
Even the smartest scientist would probably have better odds of getting in via
the EB3 category than EB1.

Yes a points system is obviously better but can be manipulated, particularly
in developing countries without consistent school quality. As soon as a
process to get visas is created it becomes an adversarial game to beat the
system. I wouldn't rate their degrees equal. India's "engineering" degrees,
for example, in my view are more akin to associate's degrees in engineering
technology or such. It's all multiple choice and cramming. Even if we ignore
how easy such an approach is to cheat, it doesn't teach them useful skills
anyway. So if they were really assessed accurately I wouldn't expect many from
India to match graduates from Germany, apart from those who attend school in
the west.

China has a lot more solid schools, at least in my area, though a lot of
rampant cheating and everything else too.

~~~
what_ever
> China has a lot more solid schools, at least in my area, though a lot of
> rampant cheating and everything else too.

China also has probably 1000x schools, so even by law of averages, there would
more scientists coming out from there compared to Monaco. And I would leave
that to companies to figure out whether a candidate is actually good enough to
be their employee or if they "cheated".

> Even the smartest scientist would probably have better odds of getting in
> via the EB3 category than EB1.

I don't understand the point. I explained that. Anyone in EB1 gets here before
anyone on EB3.

About rest of your comment, I never said two bachelors degrees should be
counted the same. Having a masters or PhD in a US university or having worked
at a US based company should count much higher.

Anyway, it seems pointless saying anything more at this point since you seem
to have a lot of issues with the points based system but you fail to see any
issues with the current system. Have a nice day.

------
bobfrost
I'm at somewhat of a cross-roads related to this matter.

Note that this mostly applies to immigrants from India or China. I'm from
India. This applies irrespective of education level (I did my Bachelors in the
US, just FYI)

Currently I'm in the US on a student visa (currently during a period of that
visa that permits me to work) that expires in a couple years. I cannot renew
it. If I want to continue working in the US. My only option is an H1-B (work)
visa.

There is basically no other option to me.

Okay, so let's say I do get the H1-B visa. Then, I have to work for a few more
years on that visa, before I'm eligible to apply for a green card - which
grants permanent resident status. Now, once I file that application, I'll be
on a waitlist. Guess how much time it takes to get a greed card? _Atleast_ 100
years. I'm not joking. Unless there's a policy change, there's no possibility.

Even if there's no possibility of me getting a green card, I can still work. I
can still buy a house, get married, have kids, etc. A lot of Indians and
Chinese in the US currently are in this limbo period, where they don't have a
green card. So they still continue to work, start a family. Because no other
country will pay as well.

But personally, I hate the uncertainty. While even getting a green card isn't
a guarantee to get to stay in the country, _not_ having a green card is much
worse. A CBP officer has the authority to deny you entry at their discretion.
If do deny entry, you are banned from entry for atleast 5 years.

That's it. You're life in the US has vanished into thin air.

While I love my current job, I trying to immigrate to Canada. You get a PR
immediately if you quality based on a points system calculated using specific,
meritocratic criteria. If I have a PR I feel I won't worry when I buy a house,
plant roots, that my life won't be upended because I failed to follow my
visa's restrictions.

~~~
sg47
Now is the time to leave. 18 years in the US with a kid born here. I missed
the boat in getting my priority date around the time when my friends were
getting theirs (my company was laying off people in other departments and my
application got audited). Didn't think it was a big deal at that time. Now, my
friends are getting their citizenships and I'm still stuck on a visa. I'm at
the whim of the Consul officer and the CBP officer every time I renew my visa
or come back into the country. Heavily vested here assuming I'll get a green
card but planning to apply for Canadian PR just in case. There's an easy way
to game the system if one is in the right situation and is willing to risk it.
Leave the country and work for the same company for a year as a manager. Come
back on a L1 visa and boom you can apply in the EB-1 category and get your
green card in a couple of years. I've quite a few friends who easily got their
green cards working for TCS, Infosys, etc. Meanwhile, with a Masters degree
and 16 years of experience, I'm at the mercy of immigration officers.

~~~
kamaal
>>Come back on a L1 visa and boom you can apply in the EB-1 category and get
your green card in a couple of years.

Those days are gone now. You go into EB-1 only if you get into the US on L1-A.
They don't give L1-A's easily these days. For starters you need to be in
director level positions to even qualify for L1-A's. Even then the waiting
period for India EB-1 itself is growing and stands at 5+ years now. And it
will only increase.

>>I've quite a few friends who easily got their green cards working for TCS,
Infosys, etc.

Put the saddle on the right horse. People who come in from those companies
often work for <$70K an year. Most are poor blokes who survive on ramen, and
giving haircuts to each other so that they can save $8.

The real deal is Cgnzt which even until recently filed L1-A's and EB-1's for
thousands/lacs of people by cooking up documents. Often promoting some one
with a BCom degree to a director, granting them a GC and then rolling back the
promotion. Thousands to lacs have made it to GC and Passports this way. When I
worked for a short time in the US, it was painful to see PhD students in
Stanford struggle for little extra stay, while some one with a basic 2 year
diploma land GCs in like an year. In fact even until recently the biggest
incentive to work at Cgnzt was this.

[https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-
business/...](https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/business/india-
business/indians-rush-for-us-citizenship-before-trump-can-shut-
doors/articleshow/73461275.cms)

8.4 lac Indians got citizenship only last year. 5.8 lac got green cards. This
is basically abuse max.

Add this to manager's pets who routinely get their documents cooked to be
Nobel Prize worthy talent and land GC's. Literally the wrongest possible
people occupy the numbers these days. Add to this a large number of body
shopping firms.

There are several top level doctors, lawyers and scientists who don't even get
B1's.

In short we Indians bought this upon ourselves. Like everything else. We abuse
things so much, so far and so blatantly it makes things impossible for the
real people when they arrive at the scene.

I'm one of those people who got burned badly due to all these politics at
every level. I have largely given up, you just need to get very lucky early
life to win at these things. Or cheat shamelessly.

~~~
rohit2412
> In short we Indians bought this upon ourselves.

I was with you till here. No, we did not bring this to ourselves. The answer
is that USA has dumb policies.

~~~
refurb
The reason for the backlog is the US is trying to get a diverse set of
immigrants to the US. Any one country can’t get more than 5% of permanent
visas in a given year.

If it wasn’t for that, 80% of people getting green cards would be Indian and
Chinese.

~~~
TheCoelacanth
That's a pretty ridiculous policy when China and India are a third of the
world's population.

------
mcpherrinm
I'm moving from San Francisco to Toronto soon.

Staying at the same job, my salary will go from $180k usd to $128k usd ($170k
cad). (Equity comp remains the same)

That's a pretty big cut, though at least for me it's worth it because of non-
monetary reasons, like being closer to family, not dealing with immigration
anymore, healthcare/education.

The money stuff isn't so bad. A downtown Toronto condo is a lot cheaper than
San Francisco. That alone makes the pay cut easy enough to swallow. Either way
I can comfortably live on a tech salary.

Starting prices for:

3 Bed SF condo: 1.2M usd

3 Bed TO condo: 0.7M usd (900k cad)

No rigorous comparison, just from me house hunting in both markets.

~~~
toephu2
How's the weather there though?

Can we just stop comparing cities? Everyone loves to complain about the cost
of living in SF and always brags about how they could buy a mansion in the
midwest.

No one cares. It's all about location. There is a reason why California is the
most populous state in the union despite it being so expensive (weather and
jobs). There is a reason the population in the midwest is so low (lack of jobs
and weather mostly).

~~~
lhorie
> How's the weather there though?

Right this moment, they are almost the same (46F in SF vs 37F in Toronto).
Toronto winter usually goes between 5F and 40F, but summer is way warmer than
SF (between 75F to 90F vs 60F to 70F in SF)

~~~
refurb
Are you picking temperatures in the middle of the night? 46F is the nightly
low in SF, versus being a record warm day in Toronto during the winter.

~~~
lhorie
Yes, that was around 9pm PST. Right now (9am PST) it's 47F in SF vs 38F in TO.
Forecast for noon today is 53F in SF vs 38F in Toronto. It is an unusually
warm winter in TO this year, though what I said about summers being warmer in
TO holds true every year.

------
bencunningham
Let's not pretend that Canadian cities are a utopia for tech workers.
Vancouver and Toronto are insanely expensive and salaries just don't compare
to those a hundred kilometres to the south. Hopefully it steadily improves but
I'm not hopeful with these tech companies having virtually an unlimited supply
and no incentive to boost salaries.

~~~
yawaramin
Toronto may be expensive but it's not SF-level expensive. Salaries may not
compare but you don't have to worry about basic things like healthcare and
high-powered weaponry in the streets.

Those are just the top two–there are many other reasons to move to Canada than
just money.

~~~
fouc
I understand SF folks are paying $500-1,000/mo for healthcare?

~~~
nitrogen
Not at high-paying tech companies, those usually cover most or all of
insurance.

~~~
klipt
You're still paying for it, but like payroll taxes it comes out of your salary
before you even see it which makes people think it's "free".

~~~
umeshunni
Sure, and if you live in Canada, you're explicitly paying for healthcare in
the form of high taxes.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Sure, and if you live in Canada, you're explicitly paying for healthcare in
> the form of high taxes.

You mean, “the United States”, not Canada, right? The US pays more (not just
per capita, but as a share of GDP, and thus would need higher taxes to pay for
it) out of public funds for healthcare than Canada does. See, e.g.,
[https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-
collection/health-...](https://www.healthsystemtracker.org/chart-
collection/health-spending-u-s-compare-countries/#item-u-s-similar-public-
spending-private-sector-spending-triple-comparable-countries)

The US, unlike Canada, also pays a bit more in private funds on healthcare
than it does in private funds.

------
zaptheimpaler
I moved from SF to Canada. Traded a higher salary and basically 0 shot at
green card for less money, a PR when I walk in and guaranteed citizenship.

Most importantly, you _cannot_ do anything besides your job on an H1B. No
start ups, no side projects. You can't even BE in the US without a job and
just bum around for a year. Every interaction with the US border folks makes
me feel like a criminal. The visa fundamentally restricts the shape of your
life in a way thats hard for residents to really understand.

I already get paid enough to retire comfortably when I'm older and it's no fun
retiring young! Retirement costs in Canada are also significantly lower if you
can count on free healthcare. Not worth it. I do miss the weather though :)

~~~
lovehashbrowns
I feel the same way, but from a different perspective since I have DACA.
Fortunately I can hop around different jobs or be unemployed, but every couple
of years I get to feel like a criminal, and there's the ever-pervasive
paradoxical feeling of not being at home but feeling like I'm home in the US.
I've been thinking about moving to Guadalajara so I can at least not worry
about my immigration status but I'm super scared that I won't feel like I'm
home there after being in the US my entire life, and I can't go back on that
decision. I've been thinking a lot about Canada as well as Europe, because I
think that'll get easier for me to acclimate to.

This whole thing is just super depressing. I feel like I've worked all my life
for a great career in the US and it's for nothing if I have to leave
everything behind at some point.

------
eralps
As unfortunate as this is, I think this only applies to Indians and Chinese. I
was surprised to see Yoluk did not want to bother applying to jobs in the US.

I am a foreign person from ROW (Rest of the World) in the US studying with F1
visa and trying to immigrate here via employment based options.

I have friends who also immigrated to Germany and Britain. The process is
definitely easier and guaranteed there but for us ROW, the process does not
look so bad to me right now. Maybe I just don't know how it should be.

After I graduate with F1, I can work up to 3 years with my OPT, companies
apply to H1-B in that period. Some start the H1-B process even before you
graduate if you have a bachelor's degree already. You have 4 chances in H1-B
in the end.

EB-2 green card is also an option for us, as far as I know I can get that in
less than 2 years. I've read about people who applied to EB-2 directly without
H1-B and got that in their STEM OPT extension duration.

Finally, even though it is a slim chance, there is also diversity visa
lottery. I have friends who got picked from DV lottery while studying here
with F1. Everything became easier for them.

The US is still attractive to people like me, I don't think how this article
portrays the immigration is true.

~~~
jdright
I keep being head hunted to work on SF/SV. And my reply is basically automatic
and always the same:

"Due to US external policy and cost of life I can't see it being financially
practical to move. Although, I would gladly consider any remote position."

I think the immigration complexity is the lesser problem there. My research
based on housing, school, transport and food tells me it looks like absurdly
expensive. To be able to even consider to move there I would need a salary
bump of 3x-5x. No way this will ever happen.

~~~
wiglaf1979
No joke. My team has three branches:

    
    
      *  Sunnyvale, CA 
      *  Bentonville, AR  
      *  Bangalore, India 
    

We regularly will gossip about best/worst aspects of each of them. My mind is
blown at how much they have to pay to live in the greater SF area. 3-4k for
_rent_ on an apartment for a small family. My mortgage is 800 a month. A
mortgage with a yard big enough for gardens, a bee hive, compost, a couple of
trees, basketball goal, fenced in yard, etc....

Of course they get to poke fun at how they cross two timezones and go back 3
decades culturally in time when they fly out to visit. ;-)

The Bangalore folk poke fun at the US based ones at how
cold/wet/expensive/boring we all are. It's all in good fun but it really does
hammer in how home is where you currently are.

Edit - I

~~~
0xffff2
Did you "gossip" about pay? Despite my sky-high rent (although 1-bedroom
apartments can certainly be had for much less than $3k) I'm financially better
off in the bay area than I would be with any outside the bay area job offer
I've gotten. My net-after-housing pay is higher here than any offer or salary
range I've seen in places I'd want to move to like Oregon or Reno.

~~~
thorwasdfasdf
are you gonna have kids? if so that equation is going to change a huge amount.
Just see what it does to your spreadsheet once you factor in 3k/month child
care, and the cost of living in a place big enough for a small family, etc.
did you look at the massive difference cost in eating out and groceries?
housing and taxes?

~~~
0xffff2
Yes, I budget down to the penny every month so I am factoring in all of it. I
don't have any interest in having kids, so that's an angle I hadn't
considered.

------
bobbytran
Toronto salaries are less than half than in the US for software developer
roles. With the high cost of living, I dont know how anyone can live there.

~~~
smnrchrds
> _____ salaries are less than half than in the US for software developer
> roles._

You can fill the blank with essentially any non-US location and it would
remain correct. Nowhere in the world pays tech workers as much as US does, in
absolute or relative terms. Most of the world, Canada included, has priced
developer salaries close to engineer salaries. The US is the sole exception
where developer salaries are priced close to doctor salaries. Let's not
pretend Canada is the outlier—US is.

I am not saying US is wrong and the rest of the world is right or vice versa
in figuring out the correct price for tech work. I am just saying that there
are two schools of thought, one the US, the other the rest of the world, and I
am sure both have good reasons for their approach.

~~~
cmdshiftf4
>The US is the sole exception where developer salaries are priced close to
doctor salaries.

This is incorrect. Good software developers in Poland, and to some extent the
Ukraine, are enjoying salaries comparable with doctors there, if not more.

~~~
ptr
Same in Sweden, good developers definitely make more than doctors, especially
if we consider total compensation.

~~~
sk0g
How much would a good developer make? I'm looking to move to Sweden from
Australia, and from what I saw there was a lot of equality in wages/
compression towards a mean for most fields.

Like in Norway, it seemed like SEs made 1.5-2x what a retail worker would
make. Makes for a happier society maybe, but I do want to live a fairly lavish
life if possible, and Australia definitely allows for that!

------
euix
As someone who did his graduate studies in Montreal and moved to NYC to work
and then back to Toronto about two years ago I can comment on this. In Toronto
I make about 10% less then what I did in NYC if you don't factor in exchange
rate. But since I did my entire academic career from undergraduate to phd in
Canada, I am able to enjoin a large amount of tuition tax credits which sort
of makes up for it. This year I invested in some property downtown Toronto
which I plan to hold onto, either living here or leasing it if I leave.

However, I think given the right opportunity I would still head back to the
U.S. Things are fucked in the U.S. but the sense of scale, velocity is
unmatched. In Toronto you feel that people's attitude is just not the same.
There is no hunger or lust to be number #1 and I have always been competitive
personality type. In NYC even traditional enterprise corporations (where I
worked) there is an intensity and drive that's missing here. Call it the
american spirit.

Salary as this stage is relatively unimportant, making 150 or 250k is about
the about the same to me. But the scale and types of opportunities is
something else. There are roles and jobs that only exist in the U.S.

That being said, for me going back is just a tour of duty, once you are past
the journeyman stage of your life and wanting to start a family, then Canada
wins unquestioned. The environment, benefits, healthcare, and most importantly
education for your children will outweigh just about any salary you can
command state-side. Because now you are talking about intangible things that
are harder and harder to buy with money.

My opinion is, stay in the U.S. when you are young and/or talented. Then, if
you are of Indian or Chinese birth, move elsewhere to start a family and take
a senior position in Canada. Typically if you come from reputable shop state-
side and demonstrate your worth, you can find a job where people will treat
you with respect for that experience. They might not be able to compensate you
the same way but you can usually get bumped up a notch.

If you are of white or European heritage and you are in a good place then you
can consider staying the U.S. if you can make it work.

------
zyang
Raw numbers don't tell the whole story. From personal experience, Canada is
great for new immigrants to get educated and started, but US always vacuums up
the best talents.

------
navidr
Just like me. I did my BSc in Iran and was applying for grad school for cs 3
years ago. I just picked Canada because of easier immigration policy. Thank
you Canada.

------
frequentnapper
Canada gets immigrants from developing countries; immigrants take advantage of
the excellent education and healthcare system, after a few years get a
citizenship, a TN visa, then move to US for a better salary and a lower rent.
USA gets the cream of the crop from Canada and wins. Canada loses.

~~~
rewq4321
If they're Canadian citizens, then aren't they still getting taxed? If by
"Canada loses", you mean that they lose entrepreneurs, then it seems like
(from what the startup scene people were saying in that article) the opposite
is actually occurring.

Also, if your hypothesis were true, you probably wouldn't see an influx of big
companies (e.g. Google, Microsoft, Intel, Uber, etc.) opening shop in Canada -
the companies are obviously moving to the people in this case. Seems fairly
obvious to me (as an Australian looking at options for permanent residence in
the US) that the US has sabotaged its brain draining ability in the last few
years.

~~~
frequentnapper
I'm a Canadian naturalized citizen. I am currently in Japan. In the last few
years since obtaining PR became a piece of cake, I have seen Indians and
Chinese coming here for a masters in a technical field (which are now a joke
to get into and graduate from as long as you can pay tuition), obtain a PR in
less than year after graduation, 3 years after that a citizenship, apply for
TN visa and get a job in US easily.

Why? Because it's very easy to do so and rent/property prices in
Vancouver/Toronto have skyrocketed but tech salaries are nothing compared to
what you can make in US in USD. Also taxes, cost of living, etc. in select
states in US (texas for example) are much lower. Even in seattle, etc. you pay
higher rent, but your salary more than makes up for it.

Canadian policy basically makes sure that we lose the brightest to US .

------
samfisher83
I understand the article is about visa, but the salary discrepancy between the
two is very large. I am sure many Canadians are moving to SV to double or
triple their salaries.

~~~
generatorguy
And their expenses!

~~~
refurb
Not even close.

I’d say expenses are 50% higher (Toronto to SF, mostly housing), but income is
100-200% higher.

------
blaser-waffle
USA-ian in Canada here. Been able to work remotely for US firms consistently
for going on ~5 years here.

I hope these changes drive up tech salaries in Canada -- I fear they won't.
Currently they're about 20-40% less than the US particularly due to the
currency difference. Cost of living is also a bit higher, and absolutely
insane in Vancouver (and a lesser degree, Toronto).

I suspect it will continue the H-1B trend, in that it companies won't pay
better wages, just outsource to cheaper Canadian labor, who are in turn taxed
higher and squeezed harder.

~~~
DraftDodger67
An increase in immigration will drive _down_ tech salaries in Canada - that's
the entire point.

And along the way they will drive up housing prices, and drive up general
revenue and consumer spending since there are simply more bodies in the
economy.

The system benefits the owners of capital and the migrants themselves, but not
existing ('legacy') Canadians.

Along the way you get all kinds of social problems caused by the excess of
males and the preponderance of Asian families to selectively abort female
fetuses.

------
jorblumesea
The situation is much more complicated. Many go to school in the US, work here
to pay off their debts for a decade, then move to Canada for citizenship.
Arguably, the US still takes "our cut" of the global workforce.

It also depends on where the immigrants come from. Chinese and Indians have
the longest wait list, and therefore its natural for them to look for better
options. They are right to do so, imo.

There's also the weather and cost, the large cities in Canada can be insanely
expensive, with terrible weather, and salaries aren't anywhere near US levels.
If your rent is 2-3k and you're making 100k CAD a year, it doesn't feel like
you're living the dream. Want to buy a home in Vancouver or Toronto? No big
deal, just fork over 1-2 million CAD for a 1 hour one way commute.

The quality of immigrants is a factor too. The US still sweeps up the best and
brightest of academia and business.

I know more than a few Canadians (from immigrant backgrounds) that moved to SV
recently purely for the weather and salary reasons. I wonder if when they get
their citizenship, many of those in the article will be back in the US or
moving there.

------
dmode
Just for perspective - green card wait for Indian tech workers in US is 100+
years. In Canada, you can permanent residency even before you land there

~~~
avocado4
And after you get a citizenship you get a TN Visa and move South to double
your income (if you're a top performer).

------
ycombonator
They will all eventually will migrate to US once the policies are relaxed.
This is a typical path for immigrants who can’t get into US directly: Rest of
the world -> Canada -> acquire TN Visa -> migrate to US

~~~
rewq4321
Except that if it goes on for too long, a bunch of people end up building a
life/business/network/etc there. Someone up-thread mentioned that this is how
Hollywood ended up on the other side of the country to New York.

It seems pretty hard to argue that the US's current immigration policies
aren't helping out Canada right now.

~~~
SamReidHughes
It's only hard to argue they aren't helping out Canadian companies'
shareholders. Other Canadians' lives don't get better in obvious ways when
yuppies move into the neighborhood.

~~~
rewq4321
I think, in the long term, their lives would get better. Their country would
end up with more resources at their disposal, which (if we look at the
countries around the world) seems fairly well correlated with quality of life
of the inhabitants.

~~~
SamReidHughes
Given Canada's immigration system, it's plausible (I'd guess likely, on a
national scale), but it still depends on parameters like the country's current
population, or the current availability of desirous places to live. For
example, it's pretty clear that without immigrants bidding up property values,
British Columbia would have had much higher net interprovincial migration. We
see the same thing in California, with people moving out because land is too
expensive.

------
rwmj
Anyone else from western Europe had their ESTA cancelled and had to apply for
B1/B2 (non-immigrant visa) just to visit the US? It happened to me at the end
of 2018, and it took me a year to get a visa. It's apparently going to be
issued this week. It was stuck in Administrative Processing the whole time.
The situation is eye-opening.

(And no, I don't have a criminal record, or indeed any hint of what I might
have "done wrong")

------
petilon
In the last decade US stock market went up by 256%. All other countries grew
below 100%. The outstanding performance of the US stock market was thanks to
tech industry. Without the tech industry we'd all be poorer whether you work
in tech or not. Anything that hurts tech hurts all Americans.

See charts here: [https://medium.com/@petilon404/us-prosperity-is-dependent-
on...](https://medium.com/@petilon404/us-prosperity-is-dependent-on-
tech-b71848b24d84)

------
freebee34
Taxes in canada are very high. The ontario income tax rate of 53.53% applies
at 220K CAD. the equivalent rate for Cali in USD is 34.75%. you then have
PST/GST (14%), way fewer deductions and european gas taxes. The one thing that
is a good deal in canada is cheap high quality education. The "free"
healthcare that you get is not very good and even the for pay services are of
surprisingly low quality.

~~~
amf12
The average tax rate for a single person making 250K in Sunnyvale is 32.93%
[1]

The average tax rate for a single person making 250K in Ontario is 39.80% [2]

But with the extra taxes you also get some better benefits like healthcare,
cheaper education. Of course if your main goal is to save as much money as you
can, then it probably better in the US because you earn more salary and USD
converts better into other currencies.

[1] [https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-
taxes#I4RNWQ9WYm](https://smartasset.com/taxes/income-taxes#I4RNWQ9WYm) [2]
[https://simpletax.ca/calculator](https://simpletax.ca/calculator)

~~~
frockington1
The parent was discussing max tax rate. As a software dev you would presumably
be much close to the max rate than the average (at least in the US)

~~~
tta
You appear to be misunderstanding the definition of "average" in this context.
The first ~50k of your income is taxed at ~20%, the next ~50k is taxed at
~30%, and so on. The average of these percentages gets you to a ~39% average
tax rate for 250k income.

Here's a detailed example (grep for "Average tax rate"):
[https://www.canada.ca/en/financial-consumer-
agency/services/...](https://www.canada.ca/en/financial-consumer-
agency/services/financial-toolkit/taxes/taxes-2/5.html)

~~~
frockington1
Ah you're right, reading comprehension was not high there on my part

------
thbr99
It stands to be seen how many of them will go back to US when the immigration
policy becomes favorable. Canada is still plan B for high skilled immigrants.
If H4 work authorization is removed, there will be a surge to Canada. Many US
skilled workers do a soft landing to get their PR cards as a plan B. Canada
should stop issuing PR cards for soft landers who are playing Canada's
immigration system.

------
jimmaswell
People who can be paid less due to being tied to visas/desperation may be a
boon to shareholders but not to the job market for locals.

~~~
commandlinefan
Who are willing to work more unpaid overtime, as well. No matter how much you
pay American citizens, they obnoxiously demand work-life balance that foreign
visa holders in fear of losing their work status don’t.

------
tengbretson
Companies that are nowhere near as successful as those in the US, developer
salaries that are nowhere near those in the US.

I don't think I get it.

~~~
amatecha
Those wildly successful US companies have Canadian offices too, usually ;)

~~~
jbay808
For some reason, they generally seem to have a policy of paying significantly
less for the same role in their Canadian office.

~~~
rhexs
Once Canada starts developing those trillion dollar home brew companies that
deliver a product most of the world uses at a high margin, I’m sure Canadian
salaries will go up to match.

~~~
jbay808
Was this comment intended as sarcasm? I'm finding it hard to read the
intention.

Anyway, I'm not so sure that's relevant. If Amazon or Microsoft pay less for
the same role and skill level in their Vancouver office than their Seattle
office, why wouldn't a Canadian company do the same? I don't think the pay
differential is due to patriotism by upper management, so I'm not sure it has
to do with where the company was founded.

In some cases proximity to the head office may be seen as worth extra pay, but
that isn't always the case either.

The reasoning seems to be "we pay less in Canada because we can", and Canadian
companies like Shopify or (in the past) RIM play the same way.

------
unishark
Might just as well say the same about every developed country's immigration
policy. Last I heard, all accepted fewer than wanted in. If you perceive you
can't get in one place you emigrate to another. Or stay home of course, making
it also a boon for developing countries' tech industry (a very good thing, in
my opinion).

------
jimthrow
The Bay Area is full. Voters certainly don’t want any growth here. It’s time
for companies to move out of the bay area

~~~
xenadu02
I'm a voter in the Bay Area and I disagree. So do many others.

The Bay Area isn't even close to full, it's just NIMBYs who hate any change
blocking things.

~~~
jimthrow
Sure there’s land everywhere especially in the east bay I can see miles and
miles of empty space even from 580

I meant politically, the Bimbys don’t want more people in the bay area that’s
why so many anti growth politicians get elected

------
adelHBN
This is really a terrible thing that's happening. We need the brains that are
immigrating to Canada!

~~~
thbr99
Don't worry, they will come to US once they become Canadian citizens on a TN
visa.

~~~
conanbatt
But what about the tax revenue, consumption and investment lost during that
period?

------
jstewartmobile
Many of these jobs can be performed anywhere--even on the go.

Whatever the ultimate corporate goals may be, this topic is clearly a control
issue, not a talent one.

In software, talent can do what it wants wherever it feels like doing it--
businesses will yield to it.

------
JaydLawrence
This was the case for me.

I was looking to move from the UK.

US salaries were the highest, but it was too difficult to get in.

So I started looking in Canada and found a job in New Brunswick.

I like it here, but part of me still wishes I could have gotten into Texas
instead.

------
geebee
It's remarkable that the United States can have the highest number of
immigrants for any country by a wide margin and still be in this position.

[https://www.pewresearch.org/global/interactives/internationa...](https://www.pewresearch.org/global/interactives/international-
migrants-by-country/)

Over 44 million residents of the US were not born in the US, as opposed to 8
million in Canada. As a percentage of the population, that's lower than
Canada, but by weight of sheer numbers, the US shouldn't have any problem with
this.

The US takes over 1.2 million immigrants into the country every year, we just
don't have much of a skilled immigration system - ours is largely based on
family reunification. Canada and Australia, on the other hand, have a points
based system that favors immigrants with education and skills.

I actually do blame the high tech industry for some of this. I just don't
think it's a "bug" that the US system was largely based on a very indentured
approach, where high tech companies got to decide who is allowed into the US
and the circumstances under which they are allowed to remain, with long,
grueling waits for a green card, where a would-be immigrant was beholden to an
employer (called a "sponsor") and could be fired and deported at the
employer's pleasure.

Facebook, Google, Apple, all the big companies - you see, what they _wanted_
was a freer, more open system where skilled immigrants got to choose what
they'd study, where they'd work, what companies they'd work for, and even
whether they'd work in tech in the first place, in accordance with their own
personal values and interests and market signals such as salary, cost of
living, and work conditions.

That's what google and Facebook _wanted_. Unfortunately, all they could get
was an visa that they bestow and control, putting them in a position to
determine micro aspects of a would-be immigrants life.

Right. This utterly corporate self serving H1B guest worker visa system that
undermines markets and is an affront to freedom did terrible damage to the
public perception of skilled immigration.

Want to be clear, I don't blame anyone for working on an H1B, this wasn't your
choice, and it was your only option. Don't blame you for going to Canada,
either. But I just don't buy it from the corporate lobbyists. This was hardly
a bug, to the companies that make heavy use of the H1B, the control over the
worker's right to live int the US is a feature, and they lobbied hard for it.

------
AzzieElbab
What boom? I see no boom

~~~
betaby
Same. I see more job listings, yet salary are not moving up. Hardly any boom.

------
nine_zeros
US was playing the last few decades with an easy cheat code of sucking in
smart immigrants while the rest of the developed world was twiddling thumbs.

Now that the US has shot itself on its foot and others are waking up, the
playing field appears to be getting more balanced once again.

~~~
tathougies
The US is still the most prefered destination country:
[https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/11/these-are-the-
countri...](https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/11/these-are-the-countries-
migrants-want-to-move-to/). It overshadows the next four popular destinations
combined.

~~~
nine_zeros
That is 2017. What happened in the last 4 years has a lagging and lasting
impact

~~~
frockington1
In the last 4 years the stock markets is up over 50% and unemployment has
plummeted. This has resulted in salaries and total comp going even higher for
everyone, and insanely higher for engineers. Living in the US likely became
more desirable in the last 4 years

~~~
fzeroracer
Do you have a source for salary and total comp spiking over the past four
years?

Because as a software engineer with a lot of software engineer friends, none
of us have seen that.

~~~
frockington1
[https://money.usnews.com/careers/best-jobs/software-
develope...](https://money.usnews.com/careers/best-jobs/software-
developer/salary)

If you are not seeing growth you may need to gain more marketable skills.
Whenever hiring people, more in demand skill sets definitely command a higher
salary

~~~
fzeroracer
You specifically said in the past four years salary and comp has spiked as a
result of the stock market and unemployment.

But what you linked does not clearly indicate that at all considering growth
has been consistent over the past 8 years. In fact it seems that salary
outlook has even slowed slightly over the past four years.

This does not match your claim at all.

------
torgian
I think it's hilarious that the tech companies in the States say that they
"can't find talent", and yet there are reasons for that.

One: These companies want to pay less for more. Smart developers are not going
to go for that, so they'll look elsewhere. Then the companies can say "Oh, we
can't find anyone, boo-hoo, let's hire someone cheaper now. From overseas."

Two: See one.

IF you don't believe me, just do a job search and see all the shit software
jobs out there. 12 bucks an hour for a full stack? 75k a year for 5 years
experience in five languages? Oh, and you gotta be DevOps too.

These companies are just trying to take advantage of a system.

