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Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

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Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#31

Post by acchow »

ibopm wrote: post #29
ninjakeyboard wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The wages in toronto have skyrocketed in the last couple years. I'm looking for functional programming people if you're interested I can pay at least $120k/year and offer considerable equity to work on realtime systems. We're profitable and not funded. We have a couple seats to fill and I'm having a hard time because people in Scala circles are expecting $150k/year in Toronto. Many of my peers are making $150k no pro…

Is that CAD or USD though? Because you're still really underpaying if it's CAD.

120CAD = 92USD. Ouch.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#32

Post by scardine »

canada_dry wrote: post #6

As a Canadian tech guy who travels to Silicon Valley and Seattle fairly frequently the impression that most US techies have is that Toronto is an awesome place to live, but it is not (yet) a magnet for top talent. There are many amazing startups at any given moment in Toronto... but many of the folks involved have their sights set on FANG.

May be Canada can't attract top talent from USA but the best half of the team that worked with me in Brazil the last couple years are now in Canada, Ireland or Germany.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#33

Post by Liru »

ninjakeyboard wrote: post #21
kirbypineapple wrote: post #13

The wages in Toronto are laughable. In the praries it's possible to make maybe 10 to 20k less than Toronto salaries but the houses are half the price.

The wages in toronto have skyrocketed in the last couple years. I'm looking for functional programming people if you're interested I can pay at least $120k/year and offer considerable equity to work on realtime systems. We're profitable and not funded. We have a couple seats to fill and I'm having a hard time because people in Scala circles are expecting $150k/year in Toronto. Many of my peers are making $150k no pro…

Where are all the Elixir jobs at in Toronto? I can't seem to find any.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#34

Post by thinkingkong »

acchow wrote: post #30
thinkingkong wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a Canada wide problem. Rather, Id even say its a !valley problem. Canadian businesses keep making this weird assumption that theres some kind of market capture but it’s really only true for people who have to stay in the city or country for some reason. The addressable hirable market is the people who chose / have to stay and havent realized being employed by a US business is as easy as switching github organ…

"!valley problem"? Seattle and New York aren't in the "valley" and have the same compensation as the valley.

I guess we’re both in the same boat data wise. What Ive seen with my last set of searches is that the valley tops the list in terms of comp. If you take the next top 10 cities things drop off pretty quickly from there. Its not to say “no other place pays as much as SF”. Just on average the salaries are way off.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#35

Post by jbarham »

Apocryphon wrote: post #20
acchow wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Toronto has the best spin department in the world. I never stop seeing listicles with Toronto in the top 3, reading about how great it is a place to live and work, and how it's become a leader in innovation/tech/art/music/film/finance. The endless fluff pieces are a bit tiresome.

How about Montréal?

Do you know French and love winter?

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#36

Post by acchow »

Apocryphon wrote: post #20
acchow wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Toronto has the best spin department in the world. I never stop seeing listicles with Toronto in the top 3, reading about how great it is a place to live and work, and how it's become a leader in innovation/tech/art/music/film/finance. The endless fluff pieces are a bit tiresome.

How about Montréal?

Maybe Montreal is optimizing its marketing to another demographic. I never see media reporting about them anywhere.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#37

Post by jandrewrogers »

thinkingkong wrote: post #17
kirbypineapple wrote: post #13

The wages in Toronto are laughable. In the praries it's possible to make maybe 10 to 20k less than Toronto salaries but the houses are half the price.

This is a Canada wide problem. Rather, Id even say its a !valley problem. Canadian businesses keep making this weird assumption that theres some kind of market capture but it’s really only true for people who have to stay in the city or country for some reason. The addressable hirable market is the people who chose / have to stay and havent realized being employed by a US business is as easy as switching github organ…

I do think it reflects more of a "not US" than a "not Silicon Valley/Seattle" problem these days. Anecdotally, I've discovered that most sufficiently large companies in the US now recognize and will credibly attempt to compete with the stratospheric Silicon Valley wages for the upper echelons of tech talent no matter where the company is located. For example, I've seen many cases of the Fortune 500, most of which are in inexpensive flyover metros in unsexy States (the US has ~55 metros with at least a million people), offering the upper end of the six-figure range for an individual contributor with exceptional skills. Seeing old, non-tech companies headquartered in Missouri or wherever doing this is a sea change.

For American software engineers, this is a brilliant change of condition. A decade ago, if you lived and wanted to work in the flyover metros, you were lucky to get six-figures at all no matter who you were or what you'd done. These days, big non-tech companies are willing to push toward a seven-figure comp package in flyover country for top tech people, in cities where almost no one makes six-figures. It has been really interesting to see.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#38

Post by acchow »

ninjakeyboard wrote: post #21
kirbypineapple wrote: post #13

The wages in Toronto are laughable. In the praries it's possible to make maybe 10 to 20k less than Toronto salaries but the houses are half the price.

The wages in toronto have skyrocketed in the last couple years. I'm looking for functional programming people if you're interested I can pay at least $120k/year and offer considerable equity to work on realtime systems. We're profitable and not funded. We have a couple seats to fill and I'm having a hard time because people in Scala circles are expecting $150k/year in Toronto. Many of my peers are making $150k no pro…

It sounds like you are fully aware that you should raise compensation. Why don't you?

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#39

Post by jandrewrogers »

thinkingkong wrote: post #34
acchow wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"!valley problem"? Seattle and New York aren't in the "valley" and have the same compensation as the valley.

I guess we’re both in the same boat data wise. What Ive seen with my last set of searches is that the valley tops the list in terms of comp. If you take the next top 10 cities things drop off pretty quickly from there. Its not to say “no other place pays as much as SF”. Just on average the salaries are way off.

As someone that regularly deals with comp in all of these cities in the US and globally (unfortunately), there are a small number of cities, like Seattle, that literally go toe-to-toe with Silicon Valley on comp in practice. This was not always the case but it is in 2018. And in the case of Seattle, they don't have income tax either, which makes it brutal to suggest people relocate from Seattle. Hence why Seattle is the fastest growing city in the US.

There may be some areas where the Valley tops the comp list, the kind of software engineering that goes on in cities varies. But for many types of software engineering where Seattle excels, such as core infrastructure code, expected hiring costs are astronomically by any general metric.

Re: Developments in tech in Toronto over the past seven years

#40

Post by grigory »

ninjakeyboard wrote: post #27
adamgravitis wrote: post #18

Toronto’s tech talent is keen... but relatively green. Since few companies have had to deal with scaling networks, users and data to the same magnitude as is common with Valley companies, it’s almost impossible to find senior engineers worthy of the title. Plenty of options for junior and intermediate, though.

Yeah. I'm struggling to find really solid engineers in the city. I need really experienced people and I can't find anyone. Even the most sr consultants and contractors have a lot of gaps and don't understand the real edge cases that appear in systems. I was lucky enough to learn from a team as we went through a google acquisition and watch and learn as the technology was scaled in both the context of a startup, and l…

Jumping into a project with a truly world-class team is a very humbling experience, and certainly something to seek out in one's career!
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