This is how my SO and I ended up in Canada. The 2013 shutdown happened smack in the middle of our post-PhD job hunt. The shutdown itself ‘only’ lasted a few we

This is how my SO and I ended up in Canada. The 2013 shutdown happened smack in the middle of our post-PhD job hunt. The shutdown itself ‘only’ lasted a few weeks and directly slowed down interviews at federal labs. However, the overall environment of uncertainty affected hiring well before—-and well afterward. It also spread beyond actual federal jobs to those that somehow interact with the government (contractors, companies with federal contracts, labs that get federal grants). Nobody wants to hire a new person just to lay them off a few months later, nor do people (especially those making academic salaries) want to jump into such a precarious situation. So....I listened pretty carefully when someone from Canada made me an offer. The salary was maybe a touch low by US standards, but it was available right now and likely to stick around. As a result, We have spent the past five years training Canadian students, building up Canadian labs, and so on. We think about coming home: we miss our friends and families, it does get cold up here, and living abroad can be strange. At the same time though, we do need steady jobs for ourselves and our research. FWIW, I don’t think we’re particularly special in this regard. Only two people from my PhD cohort are still doing research in the US (1 academic, 1 industry). The rest have gone abroad or left research, in part due to the crazy career uncertainty.