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H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

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Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#171

Post by _iofi »

loftyal wrote: post #148
dilippkumar wrote: post #101

As someone who is contemplating this move, I can share some thoughts. First, money isn’t the force that’s driving immigrants out of India and into the US, Canada etc. Among the people I know and including myself, the top driving forces are safety, good governance, clean air and water. While living in the US has the benefit of higher pay, it comes at a significant cost. Here is a short list of things I can not do whil…

I've spoken to an H1B lawyer about this, You can actually monetize your online work, just as long as the freelance company is not American. You can start up a limited company in your home country and get paid into a bank account there.

This is bad advice. It is really risky to do this and you can be barred from US forever.

Lawyers can give bad advice, and you need to triple-check non conventional advice. I used a lawyer who is really popular with YC companies. He gave me really bad advise, none of it worked eventually and I had to leave US eventually.

Be very conservative and careful when dealing with Immigration laws. Especially with the current environment.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#172

Post by diebeforei485 »

woolvalley wrote: post #168
diebeforei485 wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People who have spent a few years at Google, Facebook, Apple, etc would have accumulated more than enough assets[1] that the drop in real compensation is an easy tradeoff to make for massively reduced stress in life. And a far easier citizenship process in Canada means they won't have to worry about their kids anymore. [1] https://danluu.com/startup-tradeoffs/

No because the cost of living is very high in Canada for it's major cities. Cities where there are jobs with decent-ish pay have high housing costs, the only exception being waterloo where houses are merely expensive. Also the cost of everything is about %20 higher. The weather is also relatively bad. Overall with the high pay in the USA, it's better to be a upper-middle class person in the USA than a upper-middle cl…

The assets accumulated from 6+ years working in the Bay Area would generate more than enough interest annually to cover the difference in living costs.

I agree about the weather, but bad weather doesn't affect your mental health anywhere as much as the uncertainty in America's never-ending visa process.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#173

Post by addicted »

briandear wrote: post #107
briandear wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why don’t they get an E2 visa which is designed for immigration for those with high skills and advanced degrees? An H visa is a temporary, non-immigrant visa and was never intended as a path to a green card. Frustration around long queues for green cards for H visas doesn’t make any sense because that is, by its very definition, a non-immigrant visa. Expecting permanent residency from a non-immigrant visa is no diffe…

Why is this downvoted? Was anything in or untrue? H visas are temporary, non-immigrant visas. https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/us-visas/employme...

This is false. H1B holders pay into Social Security and Medicare, but are not allowed access to SS and Medicare benefits, precisely because it's a dual intent visa with the intention of immigration.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#174

Post by jonny_eh »

mywittyname wrote: post #54
sbierwagen wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some might draw a connection between Canada's open doors policy for skilled immigrants, and the low salaries paid.

I don't think it's the primary reason. The Canadian tech sector doesn't make nearly as much money as their US counterpart does. The country has very few dedicated software companies, and none the caliber of the FAAMGs. For comparison, the largest software company in Canada by revenue earns $1.7B, Google is in the neighborhood of $120B a year. Google/Microsoft/Facebook/Apple/etc are each individually orders of magnitu…

> Google/Microsoft/Facebook/Apple/etc are each individually orders of magnitude larger than the entire Canadian software industry combined

We just need one of those companies to get fed up and move their HQ north. Canada's tech sector would double overnight.

I can even see that happening if the next couple US elections go the wrong way.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#175

Post by paxy »

nostromo wrote: post #150
dilippkumar wrote: post #101

As someone who is contemplating this move, I can share some thoughts. First, money isn’t the force that’s driving immigrants out of India and into the US, Canada etc. Among the people I know and including myself, the top driving forces are safety, good governance, clean air and water. While living in the US has the benefit of higher pay, it comes at a significant cost. Here is a short list of things I can not do whil…

What the article failed to mention is that Trump and the Republican Congress have called for the US to change our immigration system to be more like Canada's. That is: focusing on skills and merit and limiting extended-family migration. https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2017/03/trump-c... Right now the majority of legal immigration to the US is based on having family in the US. The US has a much more expan…

Every administration and every congress in the last two decades has called for sweeping immigration overhaul. What they actually do remains to be seen.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#176

Post by xtacy »

puranjay wrote: post #59
zeroxfe wrote: post #2

As horrible as it sounds, in this specific respect, the current US administration has been really fantastic for Canada. More and more new grads are choosing to stay in the country and work with local tech companies, and we're experiencing a reverse brain-drain like never before.

My wife ruled out a US PhD precisely because of the negative signals about getting a work visa for her or for me. Canada is welcoming her with open arms

It might be worth getting a PhD first in the US and then migrating to Canada!

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#177

Post by eloff »

r00fus wrote: post #143
dilippkumar wrote: post #101

As someone who is contemplating this move, I can share some thoughts. First, money isn’t the force that’s driving immigrants out of India and into the US, Canada etc. Among the people I know and including myself, the top driving forces are safety, good governance, clean air and water. While living in the US has the benefit of higher pay, it comes at a significant cost. Here is a short list of things I can not do whil…

Well, most of the US is more temperate than most of Canada. So better like the cold/snow. Given the current US administration it might be a good trade. Of course, the great Canadian conspiracy of promoting global warming to equalize that benefit may turn the tables in a couple of decades or so... /snark

Canada is super environmentally conscious. I don't know where you get the idea from that we promote global warming, except as being a petroleum exporter (the US is a much bigger petroleum producer.) I can think of one glaring example of climate change denial among developed nations, however...

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#178

Post by village-idiot »

b1tr0t wrote: post #118
zeroxfe wrote: post #2

As horrible as it sounds, in this specific respect, the current US administration has been really fantastic for Canada. More and more new grads are choosing to stay in the country and work with local tech companies, and we're experiencing a reverse brain-drain like never before.

From a Canadian viewpoint, the last couple of years of populism has been a bit like discovering your favorite Uncle has a probably lethal opiate addiction. But, you're going to get to inherit his Corvette.

Man, too close to home.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#179

Post by addicted »

singhrk wrote: post #93
neofrommatrix wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately, it has. The process is now more opaque, and it’s taking longer to get an approval. The number of requests for evidence has increased by close to 40%. There seems to be a deliberate attempt to frustrate legal immigrants out of the US, or at least, it feels like it. This is anecdotal, but I personally know 4 families that threw in the towel and moved to Canada. So, yes, in terms of policy, nothing’s chan…

Second that. I am a legal immigrant. Been in US for 5+yrs. Work in a FAANG company. Have a valid work permit (h1b) till 2021. Came back to home country for stamping, now my case is in administrative processing for 4+ months. House/Job/Child Education, all impacted because of this.

My colleague had to provide the salaries of every employee in the company all the way up to the CEO.

Ours is not a small company. It's a decades old US company, who anyone who can guess 5 companies on the S&P 500 would know of.

Re: H-1B: As immigration furor roils Silicon Valley, Canada smooths way for techies

#180

Post by mFixman »

otalp wrote: post #82
gyani95 wrote: post #73

The UK is an amazing place as well if you are looking for tech jobs outside of Asia. Almost all major companies have offices her plus a decent startup scene.

It's also nearly impossible to permanently migrate to

You can get permanent residency after living for 5 years, and citizenship a year after that.
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