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Two things that makes Canada a bit different from teh US that might help accelerate this trend. 1) We've got really high housing prices 2) Partially related

Two things that makes Canada a bit different from teh US that might help accelerate this trend. 1) We've got really high housing prices 2) Partially related we only have 4-5 big cities. one of the US's strengths is that there are great cities in almost every state where someone can move to and find a job no matter their profession. Canada has Toronto, Vancouver, and maybe Montreal, Calgary and Ottawa. I don't say that to shit on those cities and the ones I didn't mention but we don't have alot of huge job creating cities. We just don't have the big job generating cities like other countries do because we're very concentrated in 2-3 areas. That means our population is drawn to live in the GTA(surrounding area of Toronto) or Vancouver. Work from home allows our population to spread out a bit, which is something our huge country sorely needs. it should also have the benefit of allowing people to move elsewhere and lower our property prices in the big cities. We also have had dry runs for remote work in the form of satellite US offices with minimal supervision for a long time so we've got atleast some experience in our work force with remote work before the pandemic started. WFM won't be a panacea that fixes our housing prices alone, we'll probably need to start taxing people who own multiple homes very heavily, but its a trend that could help bring them down and spread our population out to other areas,

yashap 4y ago
Mostly agree, but it doesn’t make sense to call Vancouver a big city, but Montreal only “maybe” a big city. Montreal’s metro population is 4.3 mil, Vancouver’s 2.6 mil, Montreal is a much bigger city than Vancouver, not the other way around. Also, if you’re listing Ottawa and Calgary, you should list Edmonton too, all have metro populations in the 1.4-1.5 mil range.
dalyons 4y ago
Pretty much identical story in Australia - without remote everyone’s forced to live in crazy expensive Sydney and Melbourne.
AHOHA 4y ago
Exactly! In Canada the remote work should be encouraged, before the pandemic, a friend used to drive from his small city to the train station to go to Toronto, then public transport to the office plus walk, totaling 2+ hours in the morning and another 2+ going back, I remember him always exhausted, that or taking the 401 by car plus the wasted gas. Now, he enjoys the time with family and more energetic most of the time, while staying in his small city, contributing to its economy, how’s that a bad thing from the gov perspective?
- cudgy 4y ago
  Governments are greedy. They want more tax revenue and the power huge budgets convey. Efficient use of resources is only lip service, making good talking points when getting elected. Work from home denies the governments fares and taxes for the rail system to commute to the city, property tax from the fancy offices in the commercial center, sales tax from the shops and restaurants feeding the workers at the commercial centers, sales taxes and certification fees from childcare centers, etc.

yashap 4y ago

Mostly agree, but it doesn’t make sense to call Vancouver a big city, but Montreal only “maybe” a big city. Montreal’s metro population is 4.3 mil, Vancouver’s 2.6 mil, Montreal is a much bigger city than Vancouver, not the other way around. Also, if you’re listing Ottawa and Calgary, you should list Edmonton too, all have metro populations in the 1.4-1.5 mil range.

dalyons 4y ago

Pretty much identical story in Australia - without remote everyone’s forced to live in crazy expensive Sydney and Melbourne.

AHOHA 4y ago

Exactly! In Canada the remote work should be encouraged, before the pandemic, a friend used to drive from his small city to the train station to go to Toronto, then public transport to the office plus walk, totaling 2+ hours in the morning and another 2+ going back, I remember him always exhausted, that or taking the 401 by car plus the wasted gas. Now, he enjoys the time with family and more energetic most of the time, while staying in his small city, contributing to its economy, how’s that a bad thing from the gov perspective?

cudgy 4y ago
Governments are greedy. They want more tax revenue and the power huge budgets convey. Efficient use of resources is only lip service, making good talking points when getting elected. Work from home denies the governments fares and taxes for the rail system to commute to the city, property tax from the fancy offices in the commercial center, sales tax from the shops and restaurants feeding the workers at the commercial centers, sales taxes and certification fees from childcare centers, etc.