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Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

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Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#161

Post by chx »

ericmay wrote: post #124
zozbot234 wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, Canada's bet on skilled immigration is really smart of them, and it's a neat way of side-stepping the usual social tensions that we hear about wrt. "anti-immigrant" sentiment from socially marginalized or low-income natives.

Why does Canada always get a pass on this but the US doesn’t? (This being points-based skilled immigration)

It's because of things like https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/se...

So while there certainly is a skilled worker immigration path, if you are accepted by the board as a refugee, you will be met with help and kindness. And even while waiting, we do not separate kids from you and put them in cages. And we accept the most refugees in the world: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-48696974

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#162

Post by dleslie »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #157
ttul wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you get into a senior role at one of the big tech firms, pay matches the valley. For lesser roles, Canada is cheaper, but the gap is closing rapidly as talent runs dry.

Not even remotely close for senior roles. Nowhere near.

Yep; I have friends in the 250k to 500k USD bracket who pine away at the notion of moving back home to Canada, but there's no way in hell they'd maintain that level of compensation.

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#163

Post by [deleted] »

lawnchair_larry wrote: post #156
sandworm101 wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> nearly identical culture to the United States. Lol. Maybe a similar culture to some parts of California or Washington, and that is a stretch, but Vancouver is very very different than "the United States". Live in both for a while and all the little difference (the guns, health care, government, police, civil-military relations, the environment, land use, education etc) add up to markedly different approaches to li…

Strongly disagree. The difference between somewhere like Vancouver and Seattle is much smaller than the difference between somewhere like San Francisco and Tulsa. Statement is plenty accurate.

[deleted]

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#164

Post by lawnchair_larry »

arboghast wrote: post #114
loufe wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The dollar is likely a factor, as you mention. But from their list of cities only Toronto has a crisis of home affordability. Montreal is still within sane levels and Waterloo is not too much worse.

From Toronto but live in Montreal. Rents in Montreal are going up but still no where near Toronto level. Cost of living is lower too on many levels. Of course it depends on the area but generally it's reasonable. You can live pretty comfortably on a 75k salary and lots of people in the tech sector make more than this, infosec paying even 6 figures in some places. I recently turned down an offer from Google for a job…

You probably want to keep quiet about that.

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#165

Post by marcinzm »

andrewzah wrote: post #128
ttul wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I graduated in 2000 from Computer Engineering (in Canada). A solid fraction of my peers ended up in Silicon Valley. It’s not just for the wages. Silicon Valley just where most of the jobs are and it remains the best place in the world if you’re an engineer.

The grass is always greener, I guess. I’m a software engineer from the US and I’d never move to SV in a million years. There are more things in life than money. There are so many cities here with better quality of life and lower cost of living.

>lower cost of living

Cost of living is only relevant compared to the salary you make and SV can pay very well. Quality of life wise most of the SV is a giant suburb so if you like suburbs it's about the same as anywhere else.

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#166

Post by andrewzah »

ryanwaggoner wrote: post #146
andrewzah wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The grass is always greener, I guess. I’m a software engineer from the US and I’d never move to SV in a million years. There are more things in life than money. There are so many cities here with better quality of life and lower cost of living.

Quality of life is subjective, and there are no cities that offer as much financial and career opportunity to the average senior software developer as SV does right now. Yes, cost of living is high, but you’ll still come out far ahead the average senior software dev living in some midwestern city. There are exceptions / edge cases, but they’re just that.

> you’ll still come out far ahead the average senior software dev living in some midwestern city

Come out far ahead how?

I'm already pulling close to 6 figures, and I expect to reach $120-130k in a relatively short time period. Do I -need- to move to SV and live in much shittier conditions and have an insane cost of living just to earn some more money? ... I feel that remote work makes this an outdated concept (my company is fully distributed).

I'm almost 24 and if I continue to manage my finances correctly, I should have my own spacious home by 25. I'm in South Carolina, but there are plenty of other reasonable places in the US. The money that I don't have to spend on high cost of living goes straight to my savings. I get that my situation is atypical, but it's absolutely possible to have a great life and earn great money while not living in SV. If I ever feel like I need to earn more money, there's nothing stopping me from creating my own startup, etc.

I guess I'll never have the "prestige" of working in SV, but I seem to do just fine by going to conferences and networking.

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#167

Post by ericmay »

chx wrote: post #161
ericmay wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why does Canada always get a pass on this but the US doesn’t? (This being points-based skilled immigration)

It's because of things like https://www.canada.ca/en/immigration-refugees-citizenship/se... So while there certainly is a skilled worker immigration path, if you are accepted by the board as a refugee, you will be met with help and kindness. And even while waiting, we do not separate kids from you and put them in cages. And we accept the most refugees in the world: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-48696974

> you will be met with help and kindness

How is that different than the U.S.? Are refugees not met with help and kindness in America?

> And even while waiting, we do not separate kids from you and put them in cages

While I do not agree with this tactic, I also think that this paints an unfair picture, since Canada has never experienced immigration issues to the degree that the U.S. has. Maybe the U.S. should do what Mexico did and let caravans of migrants show up at the border in Vancouver?

> https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-48696974 > And we accept the most refugees in the world

"According to the US-based Pew Research Center, which looked the the UNHCR data, 2018 was the first time the US did not lead the world in refugee resettlement since 1980."

I guess congratulations? I don't necessarily view "accepting the most refugees" as a moral calculation, nor something that should be a competition. But if you want to keep score I guess the U.S. is now 28-1 since 1980. Go America!

"The US is the world's major recipient of new asylum applications, registering 254,300 applications in 2018.

Canada was ninth on the list of new asylum claims with 55,400 registered in 2018, behind the US, Peru, Germany, France, Turkey, Brazil, Greece and Spain."

Jeez only 9th? Worse than Peru?

"An influx of asylum seekers crossing at the US-Canada border has become a political issue after approximately 40,000 people "irregularly" crossed into Canada between 2017 and 2018."

Why is this an issue for Canadians?

" Canada currently is struggling with a backlog of almost 74,000 asylum claims with applicants waiting almost two years for a hearing."

Other relevant facts from your article.

But hey, the U.S. is bad because that's what the news says.

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#168

Post by herova »

zozbot234 wrote: post #101
jonathankoren wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also with easier immigration, Canada’s talent pool will only get better. Already the US is losing people to Canada due to overly restrictive immigration laws. I’ve even heard immigration offices offering to help with Canadian immigration on the radio in the SF Bay https://www.csmonitor.com/EqualEd/2019/0304/Go-north-young-g... https://movnorth.com/

Yes, Canada's bet on skilled immigration is really smart of them, and it's a neat way of side-stepping the usual social tensions that we hear about wrt. "anti-immigrant" sentiment from socially marginalized or low-income natives.

Oh, Canadian skill immigration, did you check from which countries most of immigrants came in Canada last 5 years?

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#169

Post by cambalache »

jariel wrote: post #107

As a Candian, it seems to me so very pathetically and predictably Canadian to literally herald the surrender of your own industries to foreign takeover. Canada is (often) to tech what Mexico is to cars. Mexican 'assembly' of cars is fine and good, but they don't exactly move up the value chain from there. Canada produces a lot of decent tech people, who will work for 2/3 the wages, unfortunately, this doesn't map to…

> Now, that's a hard thing to contemplate, as 'nobody' can really compete with SV at their own game

As in total aggregate, I agree. On a per-capita basis, no. Some countries have a very healthy tech sector without being as large as in the US. Canada does not not need to have FAANG, just an F is enough.

Re: Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay

#170

Post by seanmcdirmid »

andrewzah wrote: post #166
ryanwaggoner wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quality of life is subjective, and there are no cities that offer as much financial and career opportunity to the average senior software developer as SV does right now. Yes, cost of living is high, but you’ll still come out far ahead the average senior software dev living in some midwestern city. There are exceptions / edge cases, but they’re just that.

> you’ll still come out far ahead the average senior software dev living in some midwestern city Come out far ahead how? I'm already pulling close to 6 figures, and I expect to reach $120-130k in a relatively short time period. Do I -need- to move to SV and live in much shittier conditions and have an insane cost of living just to earn some more money? ... I feel that remote work makes this an outdated concept (my co…

It really depends on the career opportunities you have in SC and how they correspond to your career aspirations. There really is nothing wrong with not going to the the valley or another big tech hub, but if you want to say, become a specialist in some area of ML, then there will only be a few places to do that. It isn’t (just) about prestige.

If your goal is a comfortable life and financial stability, then you are completely right. If you want to become a millionaire or more, then you’ll have a better shot SV. If you are really focused on a specific technical topic, then SV, if you are a generalist and enjoy your work but don’t want to live it, then SC is fine.

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