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As the others are saying, there are a lot of features to life in Canada which aren't made up for by a $20,000 difference in salary. It isn't perfect but consid

As the others are saying, there are a lot of features to life in Canada which aren't made up for by a $20,000 difference in salary. It isn't perfect but consider for example the 2017 world happiness report: http://worldhappiness.report/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2017/03/HR17-Ch2.pdf http://worldhappiness.report/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2017... Page 13 shows the world happiness ranking of Canada at #7 and USA at #14. After a certain point a bit of extra money isn't going to buy significantly more life-happiness. Of course - I hate to argue against higher pay in Canada - but it is far from the only factor.

poikniok 9y ago
What about a $200,000 difference in salary?
- alexc05 9y ago
  It depends where you start. Now, I typically don't see $200k salary differences but there might be some. If you browse Amazon, Google or Facebook in h1b databases for San Francisco or Seattle you see a range of roughly $130k to $160k. With outliers of course. If you peg that against $100k - $130 in Toronto you're going to ask yourself what portion of that increase is eaten by rent? Car? Commute time? Overtime"work culture"? Health Care? How far do I want to be from my parents? Do I want my children to grow up American? Am I a visible minority? Is the job in a region which is accepting of visible minorities ... or is it like Kansas where an Indian engineer was shot while being told to "go home"? http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/27/us/kansas-olathe-bar-shooting-indian-court/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/27/us/kansas-olathe-bar-shooting-... I'm not sure how many tech workers are really worth $200k MORE in the US but I'm certain that some of them went to try it on. If someone was worth $200k more in the states might they be able to say "how about $100k more and I do it from here?" I also suspect some of the big names are looking at coming back. Recent rumbling about Toronto becoming an AI center of excellence might hint at a certain UofT professor that we lost a few years back getting an itch to come home?
  - chongli 9y ago
    h1b databases Canadian engineers get TN visas, not H1Bs. TN visas give way more bargaining power to the employee.
    - alexc05 9y ago
      But the salaries they publish in h1b are done so to prove that they are not doing a job cheaper than a comparable American citizen could. The expectation is that h1b's statistically represent the normal curve. (Or are higher) I think it should have a good representation of expected salary.
  - gabbo 9y ago
    You make much more than $130k-$160k as an engineer at Amazon, Google, and Facebook in San Francisco or Seattle. H1B salary data is salary only, but stock and cash bonus are significant on top of that. At senior level, $240k-$300k for a dev is common for any of those companies. Growth beyond "senior" level to make $100k+ more than that is also not uncommon if you're ambitious, because the large tech companies have career ladders which supports the progression. Re: your other points. Health care is likely on par or better in the US for engineers working at Amazon/Google/Facebook (granted, you're SOL if you lose your job, so this has value; in the USA you're entitled to buying your last job's insurance for a period of time after leaving and getting the same coverage, which is probably enough to tide you over in a hot labor market like we see now, but this may not always be the case). Commute time varies. A software engineer in Toronto can afford to rent somewhere with a good commute, and rent is reasonable for how good of a city Toronto is (the new rent control rules seems likely to privilege current renters by having future renters subsidize artificially below market rent, so it's very possible Toronto rent will climb significantly in the future). But even if you're paying double the rent in SF (or similar rent in Seattle), the pay still puts you ahead. If you want to buy in Toronto on a software engineer's salary somewhere with a good commute, you're already priced out unless you're looking at condos (you're on the verge of being priced out in SF too, it's Seattle which is the standout here). Hopefully that'll change with years of continued wage growth and a decline in the value of Toronto property. That doesn't negate your very valid points re: work/life balance, inclusion, and culture (though I think the American west coast is closer to Canada than you give credit). But IMO, if you're able/willing to get one of those sorts of jobs in the US, you have more/better options than in Canada. So then it comes down to what sort of financial/lifestyle sacrifices you're willing to make to be in Toronto and what sort of familial/cultural gains you get in the process. It's completely valid to prioritize that over money, but arguing the pay is close after factoring in cost of living is disingenuous and problematic. I hear a lot of Canadian tech employers (and, amazingly, employees) use this reasoning to justify lower salaries.
azakai 9y ago
I agree pay isn't the only factor, but country-wide averages of happiness are probably misleading here. The US average includes both very happy and very unhappy areas. In particular the US has areas that are really suffering, in ways that are rarer in Canada. And those areas are probably not relevant in this discussion which is about tech workers. I'd be surprised if the average tech worker were happier in Canada than in the US - but I could be wrong of course.
nasalgoat 9y ago
$20K More like $100K difference for an average developer or senior tech. I see job postings in SV in the $150K-$200K range all the time. Top dollar here in Toronto is $100K-$120K, Canadian. So chop 25% off that.
- alexc05 9y ago
  But add in the increased housing costs & commute time. I'm not sure if there are additional concerns about health insurance (though California has recently passed single payer) I don't typically see $200k salaries but expect $130k to $160k is typical. With $110k in mind in Toronto a $2500/month net increase in rent immediately knocks off $30k. So we're looking at a salary difference between Toronto and SV of $10k (pre exchange, when compared against $150k). Now there is an exchange rate... so you might get back to a $30k increase in the USA ... but there are dozens of other factors too. If you have a Muslim sounding name or colour to your skin do you want to send your children to school there? There are factors which overrule the difference in salary.
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > (though California has recently passed single payer) No, it hasn't. (One house of the legislature has sent a bill which aims to create a single payer system, but which is not complete or implementable to the other house, largely to avoid procedural rules that would have forces starting at square zero if it wasn't passed out of that house. If the other House does the hard work of actually amending that skeleton into an actual single-payer bill that it passes, it will still have to go back to the first house and be passed there again, and then be signed by the Governor, before California will have passed single-payer.)

poikniok 9y ago

What about a $200,000 difference in salary?

alexc05 9y ago
It depends where you start. Now, I typically don't see $200k salary differences but there might be some. If you browse Amazon, Google or Facebook in h1b databases for San Francisco or Seattle you see a range of roughly $130k to $160k. With outliers of course. If you peg that against $100k - $130 in Toronto you're going to ask yourself what portion of that increase is eaten by rent? Car? Commute time? Overtime"work culture"? Health Care? How far do I want to be from my parents? Do I want my children to grow up American? Am I a visible minority? Is the job in a region which is accepting of visible minorities ... or is it like Kansas where an Indian engineer was shot while being told to "go home"? http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/27/us/kansas-olathe-bar-shooting-indian-court/index.html http://www.cnn.com/2017/02/27/us/kansas-olathe-bar-shooting-... I'm not sure how many tech workers are really worth $200k MORE in the US but I'm certain that some of them went to try it on. If someone was worth $200k more in the states might they be able to say "how about $100k more and I do it from here?" I also suspect some of the big names are looking at coming back. Recent rumbling about Toronto becoming an AI center of excellence might hint at a certain UofT professor that we lost a few years back getting an itch to come home?
- chongli 9y ago
  h1b databases Canadian engineers get TN visas, not H1Bs. TN visas give way more bargaining power to the employee.
  - alexc05 9y ago
    But the salaries they publish in h1b are done so to prove that they are not doing a job cheaper than a comparable American citizen could. The expectation is that h1b's statistically represent the normal curve. (Or are higher) I think it should have a good representation of expected salary.
- gabbo 9y ago
  You make much more than $130k-$160k as an engineer at Amazon, Google, and Facebook in San Francisco or Seattle. H1B salary data is salary only, but stock and cash bonus are significant on top of that. At senior level, $240k-$300k for a dev is common for any of those companies. Growth beyond "senior" level to make $100k+ more than that is also not uncommon if you're ambitious, because the large tech companies have career ladders which supports the progression. Re: your other points. Health care is likely on par or better in the US for engineers working at Amazon/Google/Facebook (granted, you're SOL if you lose your job, so this has value; in the USA you're entitled to buying your last job's insurance for a period of time after leaving and getting the same coverage, which is probably enough to tide you over in a hot labor market like we see now, but this may not always be the case). Commute time varies. A software engineer in Toronto can afford to rent somewhere with a good commute, and rent is reasonable for how good of a city Toronto is (the new rent control rules seems likely to privilege current renters by having future renters subsidize artificially below market rent, so it's very possible Toronto rent will climb significantly in the future). But even if you're paying double the rent in SF (or similar rent in Seattle), the pay still puts you ahead. If you want to buy in Toronto on a software engineer's salary somewhere with a good commute, you're already priced out unless you're looking at condos (you're on the verge of being priced out in SF too, it's Seattle which is the standout here). Hopefully that'll change with years of continued wage growth and a decline in the value of Toronto property. That doesn't negate your very valid points re: work/life balance, inclusion, and culture (though I think the American west coast is closer to Canada than you give credit). But IMO, if you're able/willing to get one of those sorts of jobs in the US, you have more/better options than in Canada. So then it comes down to what sort of financial/lifestyle sacrifices you're willing to make to be in Toronto and what sort of familial/cultural gains you get in the process. It's completely valid to prioritize that over money, but arguing the pay is close after factoring in cost of living is disingenuous and problematic. I hear a lot of Canadian tech employers (and, amazingly, employees) use this reasoning to justify lower salaries.

azakai 9y ago

I agree pay isn't the only factor, but country-wide averages of happiness are probably misleading here. The US average includes both very happy and very unhappy areas. In particular the US has areas that are really suffering, in ways that are rarer in Canada. And those areas are probably not relevant in this discussion which is about tech workers. I'd be surprised if the average tech worker were happier in Canada than in the US - but I could be wrong of course.

nasalgoat 9y ago

$20K More like $100K difference for an average developer or senior tech. I see job postings in SV in the $150K-$200K range all the time. Top dollar here in Toronto is $100K-$120K, Canadian. So chop 25% off that.

alexc05 9y ago
But add in the increased housing costs & commute time. I'm not sure if there are additional concerns about health insurance (though California has recently passed single payer) I don't typically see $200k salaries but expect $130k to $160k is typical. With $110k in mind in Toronto a $2500/month net increase in rent immediately knocks off $30k. So we're looking at a salary difference between Toronto and SV of $10k (pre exchange, when compared against $150k). Now there is an exchange rate... so you might get back to a $30k increase in the USA ... but there are dozens of other factors too. If you have a Muslim sounding name or colour to your skin do you want to send your children to school there? There are factors which overrule the difference in salary.
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > (though California has recently passed single payer) No, it hasn't. (One house of the legislature has sent a bill which aims to create a single payer system, but which is not complete or implementable to the other house, largely to avoid procedural rules that would have forces starting at square zero if it wasn't passed out of that house. If the other House does the hard work of actually amending that skeleton into an actual single-payer bill that it passes, it will still have to go back to the first house and be passed there again, and then be signed by the Governor, before California will have passed single-payer.)