Aside from the high cost of living in Vancouver, another problem is that Canadians are extremely inward-focused in their efforts to hire individuals from both s

Aside from the high cost of living in Vancouver, another problem is that Canadians are extremely inward-focused in their efforts to hire individuals from both startups to larger companies. From my own experience this past year: California-born and raised, I was in the market over the last 6 months, looking for software engineering jobs and applied to dozens and dozens of jobs in Vancouver, ranging from tiny startups to large companies. Not only did I receive hardly any callbacks, the ones that did politely mentioned that they were looking for Canadians first, then they'll look outside (then never got back to me). When applying to startups / larger companies in the Bay Area, I was interviewing, writing code challenges, etc., constantly as well as courted for positions. On the flip side, for Canadians across their own country, Vancouver does seem like the "hip" place to be. I have tech friends in Toronto, Montreal, and smaller cities and the lot of them are considering heading westward, and understandably so. When I visited Vancouver (Gastown, etc.), it seemed very exciting and full of the startup life. My own couple friends showed me their own startups and it felt very "Silicon Valley"-esque. I should also point out that one of my friends did offer me a position at his company, but the pay was incredibly low (while rent would remain very high), which I believe to be a symptom of most places outside of California (or maybe America, not sure).