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Former Vancouverite here. I really wanted to work in Vancouver, but I simply could not justify taking the ~$80k CAD offer I had in Vancouver over an ~$140k USD

Former Vancouverite here. I really wanted to work in Vancouver, but I simply could not justify taking the ~$80k CAD offer I had in Vancouver over an ~$140k USD offer from a company in SF. Even when taking into account the cost of living difference, which worked out to be about the same as the ratio between the salaries, the higher salary in SF wins out because given similar savings rates, the higher your salary, the larger your raw savings in dollars will be (unless you have a savings rate of 0% or lower, which is a rarity among well-paid software engineers). This is before even taking into account the difference in purchasing power between the two currencies. Collectively, the tech industry in Canada would reap great long-term benefits from offering salaries that are competitive with those in the US. But companies acting in short-term self-interest only try to pay their employees the bare minimum they can get away with in order to be able to claim to offer these pathetic, so-called "market-rate" Canadian salaries, with little regard to the fact that so much of the higher end of this talent pool that they could have competed for have already been brain-drained away. This then inevitably leads to the industry generally undercompeting as a whole, which results in poorer revenues and lower interest from potential investors, which then means there's less available capital to invest in the workforce, and so the whole vicious cycle repeats itself. So many once prominent Canadian tech companies have already fallen prey to this sorry state of affairs. I wonder what kind of wake-up call the industry will need to finally break out of this pattern.

adventured 9y ago
How does stock compensation factor further into the realistic comparison? Given there are vastly more and far larger public tech companies in the US & California than in Canada. Companies like Google, Oracle, Salesforce, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, et al. can drown their employees in additional compensation via stock, which very few companies in Canada can compete with. That $140k salary should become $200k+ with stock compensation over time. Most California tech employees don't work for start-ups that fail to realize equity value, so the additional compensation from stock is a very real, very substantial factor on top.
crdoconnor 9y ago
I felt exactly the same way about Singapore. Penny pinching, MBA-ish types who don't get tech running everything, a confucianist predilection towards authoritarian managerial styles and nobody rocking the boat makes it something of a tech wasteland. Ironic cos the government has Silicon Valley envy and they've got it real bad - spraying cash liberally at everyone except actual developers in an attempt to clone the magic.
- mailshanx 9y ago
  Interesting perspective! As an engineer contemplating SG, I would love to hear your Singapore story - what did you find there, and what did you eventually do?
  - crdoconnor 9y ago
    I found it was 98% companies like ^^ that. The companies I actually worked in were bad. I found two companies that seemed more or less sane (ok, but neither blew me away). One of them was receptive to hiring me but I got a different offer before we worked things out which I took and regretted. The other deliberated for, I think, two months before giving me an offer. That was more or less the last straw. I turned them down, returned to London after that and doubled my take home pay. Not long after I returned I discovered that not one but both of these companies were acquihired by Google when they opened an office in SG. I had a good chuckle at that. Yeah, I'd avoid it. There are pockets of good stuff as there are anywhere, but I think they're fewer and further between.
    - lzy 9y ago
      > Not long after I returned I discovered that not one but both of these companies were acquihired by Google when they opened an office in SG. Do you mean the 2 companies were both acquihired by Google when Google opened the Singapore office? Since that's many years ago, out of curiosity, do you mind sharing the 2 companies' names? Thank you.
praulv 9y ago
How does this square against the housing situation? From what I've heard Vancouver housing is comparable to London.
- walrus01 9y ago
  Vancouver has the tech salaries of a small city like Boise and the housing costs of San Francisco.
  - njloof 9y ago
    Come try Montréal, the housing is fine!
    - adsfasdfsad111 9y ago
      yeah but unfortunately you'll have to live in Montreal :(
randomdata 9y ago
> Collectively, the tech industry in Canada would reap great long-term benefits from offering salaries that are competitive with those in the US. But companies acting in short-term self-interest only try to pay their employees the bare minimum they can get away with What is the benefit (other than, like most people, wishing that you could make more money)? The only thing I can think of is that you believe people who bring something extra special to a business expect more, but those specific people are already paid more than the typical tech worker because they bring something special that is worth paying more for. For tech people in general, the pay is low, relatively speaking, because the market is saying that Canada does not need more tech people. That is, compared to the US which has a much greater need for more tech professionals; we're still a long way from sales clerk-level overabundance of labour. In Canada there are fewer tech jobs overall, while being a society that puts intense social pressure on its youth to focus on getting jobs like these. There's a reason Canada is named the most educated nation on earth and it's precisely why the pay is comparatively low for these types of jobs. If we want higher pay we either need a lot more tech work, or fewer people willing and able to work in the tech industry.
- fro0116 9y ago
  In case I wasn't being clear enough, by benefits, I meant benefits from the perspective of the Canadian tech industry, not necessarily from the perspective of Canadian society as a whole (that's a much more complex and nuanced subject, one that I haven't made up my mind on myself, and your points certainly seem valid). And the most obvious such benefit I can think of is slowing and/or reversing the longstanding trend of the Canadian tech industry losing some of its best talent to the US because of salary disparity.
  - randomdata 9y ago
    > And the most obvious benefit I can think of is slowing and/or reversing the longstanding trend of the Canadian tech industry losing some of its best talent to the US because of salary disparity. The best talent that offers something special has no trouble attracting far more than $80,000/year in Canada. The people being offered $80,000/year are not the top talent that you speak of. That is an average, representing the average. And for average people, that's a feature to see them leave the country for places that need them more. Again, we simply don't have enough work in Canada for all the tech people Canada is producing. We, as a society, put intense pressure on our youth to strive for careers like these and as a result we are pumping them out at rate that is well beyond the actual need for them (domestically). If everyone who is capable of tech work that came up in Canada remained in Canada, the job would be quickly approaching minimum wage for an average worker. The fact that we have so many leaving for the US is the only thing that has allowed us to maintain something as a high as $80,000 average tech salaries.

adventured 9y ago

How does stock compensation factor further into the realistic comparison? Given there are vastly more and far larger public tech companies in the US & California than in Canada. Companies like Google, Oracle, Salesforce, Microsoft, Amazon, Facebook, et al. can drown their employees in additional compensation via stock, which very few companies in Canada can compete with. That $140k salary should become $200k+ with stock compensation over time. Most California tech employees don't work for start-ups that fail to realize equity value, so the additional compensation from stock is a very real, very substantial factor on top.

crdoconnor 9y ago

I felt exactly the same way about Singapore. Penny pinching, MBA-ish types who don't get tech running everything, a confucianist predilection towards authoritarian managerial styles and nobody rocking the boat makes it something of a tech wasteland. Ironic cos the government has Silicon Valley envy and they've got it real bad - spraying cash liberally at everyone except actual developers in an attempt to clone the magic.

mailshanx 9y ago
Interesting perspective! As an engineer contemplating SG, I would love to hear your Singapore story - what did you find there, and what did you eventually do?
- crdoconnor 9y ago
  I found it was 98% companies like ^^ that. The companies I actually worked in were bad. I found two companies that seemed more or less sane (ok, but neither blew me away). One of them was receptive to hiring me but I got a different offer before we worked things out which I took and regretted. The other deliberated for, I think, two months before giving me an offer. That was more or less the last straw. I turned them down, returned to London after that and doubled my take home pay. Not long after I returned I discovered that not one but both of these companies were acquihired by Google when they opened an office in SG. I had a good chuckle at that. Yeah, I'd avoid it. There are pockets of good stuff as there are anywhere, but I think they're fewer and further between.
  - lzy 9y ago
    > Not long after I returned I discovered that not one but both of these companies were acquihired by Google when they opened an office in SG. Do you mean the 2 companies were both acquihired by Google when Google opened the Singapore office? Since that's many years ago, out of curiosity, do you mind sharing the 2 companies' names? Thank you.

praulv 9y ago

How does this square against the housing situation? From what I've heard Vancouver housing is comparable to London.

walrus01 9y ago
Vancouver has the tech salaries of a small city like Boise and the housing costs of San Francisco.
- njloof 9y ago
  Come try Montréal, the housing is fine!
  - adsfasdfsad111 9y ago
    yeah but unfortunately you'll have to live in Montreal :(

randomdata 9y ago

> Collectively, the tech industry in Canada would reap great long-term benefits from offering salaries that are competitive with those in the US. But companies acting in short-term self-interest only try to pay their employees the bare minimum they can get away with What is the benefit (other than, like most people, wishing that you could make more money)? The only thing I can think of is that you believe people who bring something extra special to a business expect more, but those specific people are already paid more than the typical tech worker because they bring something special that is worth paying more for. For tech people in general, the pay is low, relatively speaking, because the market is saying that Canada does not need more tech people. That is, compared to the US which has a much greater need for more tech professionals; we're still a long way from sales clerk-level overabundance of labour. In Canada there are fewer tech jobs overall, while being a society that puts intense social pressure on its youth to focus on getting jobs like these. There's a reason Canada is named the most educated nation on earth and it's precisely why the pay is comparatively low for these types of jobs. If we want higher pay we either need a lot more tech work, or fewer people willing and able to work in the tech industry.

fro0116 9y ago
In case I wasn't being clear enough, by benefits, I meant benefits from the perspective of the Canadian tech industry, not necessarily from the perspective of Canadian society as a whole (that's a much more complex and nuanced subject, one that I haven't made up my mind on myself, and your points certainly seem valid). And the most obvious such benefit I can think of is slowing and/or reversing the longstanding trend of the Canadian tech industry losing some of its best talent to the US because of salary disparity.
- randomdata 9y ago
  > And the most obvious benefit I can think of is slowing and/or reversing the longstanding trend of the Canadian tech industry losing some of its best talent to the US because of salary disparity. The best talent that offers something special has no trouble attracting far more than $80,000/year in Canada. The people being offered $80,000/year are not the top talent that you speak of. That is an average, representing the average. And for average people, that's a feature to see them leave the country for places that need them more. Again, we simply don't have enough work in Canada for all the tech people Canada is producing. We, as a society, put intense pressure on our youth to strive for careers like these and as a result we are pumping them out at rate that is well beyond the actual need for them (domestically). If everyone who is capable of tech work that came up in Canada remained in Canada, the job would be quickly approaching minimum wage for an average worker. The fact that we have so many leaving for the US is the only thing that has allowed us to maintain something as a high as $80,000 average tech salaries.