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I've also lived in Toronto and Vancouver. Did the obligatory move to work as a software dev in California and now live in Australia. The fact is that tech salar

I've also lived in Toronto and Vancouver. Did the obligatory move to work as a software dev in California and now live in Australia. The fact is that tech salaries in Canada are still much lower than the US while the cost of living, especially housing, is still very high, for Vancouver and Toronto in particular. Not to mention the lousy winters. Spend any time browsing /r/vancouver or /r/toronto and you'll quickly realize that the cost of living is a huge problem. The Vancouver housing market in particular has been absurdly inflated by out of control money laundering. Local salaries and house prices are totally out of whack. Follow https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/ https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/ to see what money laundering has done to the Vancouver housing market. https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/status/1221315000897163264 https://twitter.com/mortimer_1/status/1221315000897163264 is a particularly amusing recent thread showing where a would-be landlord writes: "This home is in rough shape and needs painting, and TLC. Looking for long term tenant willing to put labour in while landlord covers all material costs." All this for only $5650/month!

endgame 7y ago
You left Canada because the housing market was a rort, and chose to come to AUSTRALIA!?
- linkregister 7y ago
  The median salary in Vancouver is substantially lower than Sydney, and its property values are similar. Vancouver salaries are also lower than almost all of Canada's metros, while having the highest property costs. Vancouver also has the best weather. The Canadian metro with the best opportunity and lowest comparative costs is Montreal.
  - kazinator 7y ago
    > The median salary in Vancouver is substantially lower than Sydney, and its property values are similar. Not that you actually own that property value in Vancouver. If you run away and go work somewhere else for a year, and don't rent it, you owe Vancouver a hefty empty home tax.
    - 8note 7y ago
      ideally you'd be taxed at a higher rate than that just as property tax, regardless of whether it's empty, being rented, or lived in
      - CountSessine 7y ago
        You still have to pay property tax - but you also have to pay an empty home tax on top of that.
  - blackrock 7y ago
    Why is property value in Sydney so high? You have only 30 million people, living on an island continent the size of the United States. And is the country with probably the longest warm water coastline on the planet.
    - deleted 7y ago
      [deleted]
    - madeofpalk 7y ago
      Probably the same as anywhere else. Many people want to live in a limited area, house prices go up. People who can afford them buy them, which keeps house prices there.
    - mcbain 7y ago
      The inland of Australia is nothing like inland North America. There is very little water, much is literally desert. Something like 85% of the population lives within 50km of the coastline.
      - blackrock 7y ago
        The desert sounds like a good place to harvest the sun. Install some solar panels, and use it to crack water, to make hydrogen, and convert it to ammonia. Australia can power the next fuel cell revolution.
        Retric 7y ago
        That’s taking a huge efficiency hit over using batteries while costing more money. What’s the goal?
        tgflynn 7y ago
        Liquid hydrogen and liquid ammonia have almost 10x the energy density of current battery technology. If you could go all the way to synthesized hydrocarbons it's another 2x. I'm not sure efficiency matters that much when you have far more energy production capacity than you need but it's concentrated in places and times where you can't use it. As for costing more: compared to what ? Batteries don't seem like an economically effective option for storing solar energy at massive scale, do they ? And in any case they don't allow the stored energy to be shipped to other locations.
- jbarham 7y ago
  Sure, I rent a large, new, 3 bedroom house 20 minutes by train from the Melbourne CBD for $2250/month. It's great. I certainly couldn't do that in Toronto or Vancouver. Granted if you want to buy a house, Australia (especially Sydney) is expensive for a bunch of reasons (negative gearing etc). But Toronto is still more expensive than Melbourne and Vancouver is much more expensive.
  - throw0101a 7y ago
    > 3 bedroom house 20 minutes by train from the Melbourne CBD for $2250/month. For comparison, that is the cost of renting a one bedroom condo (downtown) in Toronto: * https://rentals.ca/national-rent-report https://rentals.ca/national-rent-report * https://dailyhive.com/toronto/monthly-rent-predictions-toronto-2020 https://dailyhive.com/toronto/monthly-rent-predictions-toron...
starfallg 7y ago
>Not to mention the lousy winters. The winters of the few years I spent living in Vancouver were the best in my life. I still go back (from the UK) now and then to enjoy it.
brailsafe 7y ago
Ya but nobody is renting at $5650. Living costs and scarcity are a real problem, but more likely to be around $1300 to $2800 depending on area and size.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
omarhaneef 7y ago
I've heard this complaint -- that the property prices are high -- however, isn't there an opportunity to put a tech hub right on the border with Seattle? Make the commute even smaller and set up a whole border town? Just wondering why a developer doesn't make it a great place to live bring cafes, housing etc.
- chrchang523 7y ago
  Seattle is too far from the Canadian border.
thisisnico 7y ago
I'm a tech worker in Canada and can agree that the tech salaries are nowhere close to the US. Housing is pretty high as well. The better paying jobs are in government.
- dmurdoch 7y ago
  I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'd like some numbers to back up the government comment. I live in Ottawa, my SO works for government as does many many friends. I make more then all of them. If you speak french, then maybe this is true as you can move up to director etc. but the VAST majority of the people I know in government do not make more than devs I know.
  - blaser-waffle 7y ago
    I'm a USA-ian in Canada, working remotely. I'm in a big Canadian city, we have a hockey team. The average IT salaries where I live are in the ballpark of 70-100k Canadian Dollars (CAD) -- at least according to Indeed.ca, LinkedIn, and Glassdoor. Given a 20-30% currency difference that's capping out at around $80K US Dollars (USD). Not terrible by US national standards, but not impressive for tech; i.e EMC offered me $66k USD out of college in 2008. Meanwhile, on Reddit's r/networking, or r/sysadmin, where they have periodic salary surveys, network engineers in NoVA or Chicago are pulling $105k-115 USD with only 5 years experience and a CCNA -- and that's just an average, you can often do way better. In Calgary the highest salaries were related to oil companies, and for tech they seemed to cap out at around $150K CAD for SCADA devs, instrumentation specialists, etc. I'm sure there are higher paying gigs available, but you're getting into specialized, only-found-by-word-of-mouth roles. I've been lucky to be remote for the past 5 years, working for US firms, but if I wasn't it would probably be close to a 50% pay cut, on top of a higher cost of living. The COL wouldn't shock someone from NoVA or Seattle or Chicago but it's higher than you'd think. Re: Ottawa -- I'd assume that, like Washington DC, the government contracting and federal bureaucracy are effectively their own mini employment universe that plays by their own rules, and doesn't reflect the rest of the country (e.g. security clearances mean your job can't be outsourced to India). Source: am from DC originally.
deepGem 7y ago
More than anything I didn't get a tech vibe in Toronto. I was at UofT and the surroundings all the time, yet it felt like the town is mostly devoid of tech. Not the same vibe you get in Seattle or Redmond or SV for that matter. May be it's my bias but Toronto doesn't feel all that multi cultural. Sure you see people of different nationalities but something feels lacking.
- wenc 7y ago
  > More than anything I didn't get a tech vibe in Toronto. I was at UofT and the surroundings all the time, yet it felt like the town is mostly devoid of tech. Not the same vibe you get in Seattle or Redmond or SV for that matter. Toronto is more of a finance town, with tech tacked on. NYC is similar. > May be it's my bias but Toronto doesn't feel all that multi cultural. Sure you see people of different nationalities but something feels lacking. Curious, what cities around the world feel multicultural to you? I've lived in many multicultural cities and my criteria may be different from yours, so genuinely interested to hear your thoughts.
  - deepGem 7y ago
    One of the most diverse and mutli-cultural cities that I have lived in, is London, followed by New York City. I have lived in Singapore and Toronto as well but they don't match London or NYC.
    - wenc 7y ago
      I think I would agree with you. London and NYC have been immigrant destinations for much longer than Toronto has. London of course draws its immigrants from Commonwealth countries. NYC draws immigrants from all over. Toronto's immigrants are much newer and Toronto's reputation for multiculturalism is actually only a few decades old (there hasn't been time for a deep multicultural identity to emerge). Multiculturalism entered the national conversation in 1971. In the decades prior to that, Toronto was very much still a stodgy Anglo-Saxon enclave, with Montreal being the multicultural hub of Canada. That said, certain large global demographics are underrepresented in London (east Asians for instance, but not south Asians). Hispanics are underrepresented in Toronto. I feel NYC is the only city in the world where most of the world's major demographics are on balance well-represented. Singapore is actually not that multicultural (there are only four major races/cultures). I would say it's more international than multicultural, because the residual diversity come from people who are expats rather than immigrants.
pesfandiar 7y ago
> see what money laundering has done to the Vancouver housing market. It's inconclusive at best, and misidentifying the major causes in this complicated crisis could hurt any effort to alleviate housing pains. Money laundering does happen in BC, and some of the proceeds do go into higher end housing. One can argue the restrictive zoning and ever-increasing costs and hurdles to new developments are orders of magnitude more influential on the market than the hot money. We have heavily left-leaning councilors in Vancouver that vote down any rental property project, solely to prevent private parties from making any profit.
msie 7y ago
Saying that money laundering solely affected the Vancouver housing market is simplistic and the press is successful in pushing this narrative. How about other factors like lots of people want to move to Vancouver (only major Canadian city on the west coast) and the effect of major tech companies setting up shop here? Also the greed of condo developers and landlords?

endgame 7y ago

You left Canada because the housing market was a rort, and chose to come to AUSTRALIA!?

linkregister 7y ago
The median salary in Vancouver is substantially lower than Sydney, and its property values are similar. Vancouver salaries are also lower than almost all of Canada's metros, while having the highest property costs. Vancouver also has the best weather. The Canadian metro with the best opportunity and lowest comparative costs is Montreal.
- kazinator 7y ago
  > The median salary in Vancouver is substantially lower than Sydney, and its property values are similar. Not that you actually own that property value in Vancouver. If you run away and go work somewhere else for a year, and don't rent it, you owe Vancouver a hefty empty home tax.
  - 8note 7y ago
    ideally you'd be taxed at a higher rate than that just as property tax, regardless of whether it's empty, being rented, or lived in
    - CountSessine 7y ago
      You still have to pay property tax - but you also have to pay an empty home tax on top of that.
- blackrock 7y ago
  Why is property value in Sydney so high? You have only 30 million people, living on an island continent the size of the United States. And is the country with probably the longest warm water coastline on the planet.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
  - madeofpalk 7y ago
    Probably the same as anywhere else. Many people want to live in a limited area, house prices go up. People who can afford them buy them, which keeps house prices there.
  - mcbain 7y ago
    The inland of Australia is nothing like inland North America. There is very little water, much is literally desert. Something like 85% of the population lives within 50km of the coastline.
    - blackrock 7y ago
      The desert sounds like a good place to harvest the sun. Install some solar panels, and use it to crack water, to make hydrogen, and convert it to ammonia. Australia can power the next fuel cell revolution.
      - Retric 7y ago
        That’s taking a huge efficiency hit over using batteries while costing more money. What’s the goal?
        tgflynn 7y ago
        Liquid hydrogen and liquid ammonia have almost 10x the energy density of current battery technology. If you could go all the way to synthesized hydrocarbons it's another 2x. I'm not sure efficiency matters that much when you have far more energy production capacity than you need but it's concentrated in places and times where you can't use it. As for costing more: compared to what ? Batteries don't seem like an economically effective option for storing solar energy at massive scale, do they ? And in any case they don't allow the stored energy to be shipped to other locations.
jbarham 7y ago
Sure, I rent a large, new, 3 bedroom house 20 minutes by train from the Melbourne CBD for $2250/month. It's great. I certainly couldn't do that in Toronto or Vancouver. Granted if you want to buy a house, Australia (especially Sydney) is expensive for a bunch of reasons (negative gearing etc). But Toronto is still more expensive than Melbourne and Vancouver is much more expensive.
- throw0101a 7y ago
  > 3 bedroom house 20 minutes by train from the Melbourne CBD for $2250/month. For comparison, that is the cost of renting a one bedroom condo (downtown) in Toronto: * https://rentals.ca/national-rent-report https://rentals.ca/national-rent-report * https://dailyhive.com/toronto/monthly-rent-predictions-toronto-2020 https://dailyhive.com/toronto/monthly-rent-predictions-toron...

starfallg 7y ago

>Not to mention the lousy winters. The winters of the few years I spent living in Vancouver were the best in my life. I still go back (from the UK) now and then to enjoy it.

brailsafe 7y ago

Ya but nobody is renting at $5650. Living costs and scarcity are a real problem, but more likely to be around $1300 to $2800 depending on area and size.

deleted 7y ago

[deleted]

omarhaneef 7y ago

I've heard this complaint -- that the property prices are high -- however, isn't there an opportunity to put a tech hub right on the border with Seattle? Make the commute even smaller and set up a whole border town? Just wondering why a developer doesn't make it a great place to live bring cafes, housing etc.

chrchang523 7y ago
Seattle is too far from the Canadian border.

thisisnico 7y ago

I'm a tech worker in Canada and can agree that the tech salaries are nowhere close to the US. Housing is pretty high as well. The better paying jobs are in government.

dmurdoch 7y ago
I'm not saying you're wrong, but I'd like some numbers to back up the government comment. I live in Ottawa, my SO works for government as does many many friends. I make more then all of them. If you speak french, then maybe this is true as you can move up to director etc. but the VAST majority of the people I know in government do not make more than devs I know.
- blaser-waffle 7y ago
  I'm a USA-ian in Canada, working remotely. I'm in a big Canadian city, we have a hockey team. The average IT salaries where I live are in the ballpark of 70-100k Canadian Dollars (CAD) -- at least according to Indeed.ca, LinkedIn, and Glassdoor. Given a 20-30% currency difference that's capping out at around $80K US Dollars (USD). Not terrible by US national standards, but not impressive for tech; i.e EMC offered me $66k USD out of college in 2008. Meanwhile, on Reddit's r/networking, or r/sysadmin, where they have periodic salary surveys, network engineers in NoVA or Chicago are pulling $105k-115 USD with only 5 years experience and a CCNA -- and that's just an average, you can often do way better. In Calgary the highest salaries were related to oil companies, and for tech they seemed to cap out at around $150K CAD for SCADA devs, instrumentation specialists, etc. I'm sure there are higher paying gigs available, but you're getting into specialized, only-found-by-word-of-mouth roles. I've been lucky to be remote for the past 5 years, working for US firms, but if I wasn't it would probably be close to a 50% pay cut, on top of a higher cost of living. The COL wouldn't shock someone from NoVA or Seattle or Chicago but it's higher than you'd think. Re: Ottawa -- I'd assume that, like Washington DC, the government contracting and federal bureaucracy are effectively their own mini employment universe that plays by their own rules, and doesn't reflect the rest of the country (e.g. security clearances mean your job can't be outsourced to India). Source: am from DC originally.

deepGem 7y ago

More than anything I didn't get a tech vibe in Toronto. I was at UofT and the surroundings all the time, yet it felt like the town is mostly devoid of tech. Not the same vibe you get in Seattle or Redmond or SV for that matter. May be it's my bias but Toronto doesn't feel all that multi cultural. Sure you see people of different nationalities but something feels lacking.

wenc 7y ago
> More than anything I didn't get a tech vibe in Toronto. I was at UofT and the surroundings all the time, yet it felt like the town is mostly devoid of tech. Not the same vibe you get in Seattle or Redmond or SV for that matter. Toronto is more of a finance town, with tech tacked on. NYC is similar. > May be it's my bias but Toronto doesn't feel all that multi cultural. Sure you see people of different nationalities but something feels lacking. Curious, what cities around the world feel multicultural to you? I've lived in many multicultural cities and my criteria may be different from yours, so genuinely interested to hear your thoughts.
- deepGem 7y ago
  One of the most diverse and mutli-cultural cities that I have lived in, is London, followed by New York City. I have lived in Singapore and Toronto as well but they don't match London or NYC.
  - wenc 7y ago
    I think I would agree with you. London and NYC have been immigrant destinations for much longer than Toronto has. London of course draws its immigrants from Commonwealth countries. NYC draws immigrants from all over. Toronto's immigrants are much newer and Toronto's reputation for multiculturalism is actually only a few decades old (there hasn't been time for a deep multicultural identity to emerge). Multiculturalism entered the national conversation in 1971. In the decades prior to that, Toronto was very much still a stodgy Anglo-Saxon enclave, with Montreal being the multicultural hub of Canada. That said, certain large global demographics are underrepresented in London (east Asians for instance, but not south Asians). Hispanics are underrepresented in Toronto. I feel NYC is the only city in the world where most of the world's major demographics are on balance well-represented. Singapore is actually not that multicultural (there are only four major races/cultures). I would say it's more international than multicultural, because the residual diversity come from people who are expats rather than immigrants.

pesfandiar 7y ago

> see what money laundering has done to the Vancouver housing market. It's inconclusive at best, and misidentifying the major causes in this complicated crisis could hurt any effort to alleviate housing pains. Money laundering does happen in BC, and some of the proceeds do go into higher end housing. One can argue the restrictive zoning and ever-increasing costs and hurdles to new developments are orders of magnitude more influential on the market than the hot money. We have heavily left-leaning councilors in Vancouver that vote down any rental property project, solely to prevent private parties from making any profit.

msie 7y ago

Saying that money laundering solely affected the Vancouver housing market is simplistic and the press is successful in pushing this narrative. How about other factors like lots of people want to move to Vancouver (only major Canadian city on the west coast) and the effect of major tech companies setting up shop here? Also the greed of condo developers and landlords?