Vancouverite here. When major tech companies started setting up satellite offices here, I assumed it'd be a temporary situation, and that we'd be at the mercy of any change in the U.S. immigration process. The longer there's an immigration bottleneck though, the more entrenched these companies become here. There are more senior roles opening up here all the time, and salaries are increasing in this competitive market.

From my experience on the media / marketing side of things, a lot of people moving here that didn't consider the U.S. as an option. For some roles, our entire crop of interviewees have moved to Canada from other countries.

Yes, the U.S. immigration situation is helping the Canadian tech scene, but cities like Vancouver and Toronto are more than a mere crashpad for people waiting to move to SV. There's real momentum here as well.

The drop from 92% to 75% isn’t the complete story, or even the more important story.

The real problem is all the other nonsense people have to deal with.

We have a really great employee who single handedly wrote most of the company’s build infrastructure, and was happy in the US on his H1B because while it requires renewal every 3 years, he was well paid and enjoying his life.

Until about a year and a half ago when he went back to renew his visa in India but didn’t get an approval for about 6 months. The approval process required the company to submit the salaries of the entire 15000+ global employees from the janitors to the CEO.

Once his visa was approved, he packed his bags and moved to Toronto within a couple of months. And our company has stopped hiring more tech workers in the US because they don’t want to have to deal with this anymore.

I'm at somewhat of a cross-roads related to this matter.

Note that this mostly applies to immigrants from India or China. I'm from India. This applies irrespective of education level (I did my Bachelors in the US, just FYI)

Currently I'm in the US on a student visa (currently during a period of that visa that permits me to work) that expires in a couple years. I cannot renew it. If I want to continue working in the US. My only option is an H1-B (work) visa.

There is basically no other option to me.

Okay, so let's say I do get the H1-B visa. Then, I have to work for a few more years on that visa, before I'm eligible to apply for a green card - which grants permanent resident status. Now, once I file that application, I'll be on a waitlist. Guess how much time it takes to get a greed card? Atleast 100 years. I'm not joking. Unless there's a policy change, there's no possibility.

Even if there's no possibility of me getting a green card, I can still work. I can still buy a house, get married, have kids, etc. A lot of Indians and Chinese in the US currently are in this limbo period, where they don't have a green card. So they still continue to work, start a family. Because no other country will pay as well.

But personally, I hate the uncertainty. While even getting a green card isn't a guarantee to get to stay in the country, not having a green card is much worse. A CBP officer has the authority to deny you entry at their discretion. If do deny entry, you are banned from entry for atleast 5 years.

That's it. You're life in the US has vanished into thin air.

While I love my current job, I trying to immigrate to Canada. You get a PR immediately if you quality based on a points system calculated using specific, meritocratic criteria. If I have a PR I feel I won't worry when I buy a house, plant roots, that my life won't be upended because I failed to follow my visa's restrictions.

I'm moving from San Francisco to Toronto soon.

Staying at the same job, my salary will go from $180k usd to $128k usd ($170k cad). (Equity comp remains the same)

That's a pretty big cut, though at least for me it's worth it because of non-monetary reasons, like being closer to family, not dealing with immigration anymore, healthcare/education.

The money stuff isn't so bad. A downtown Toronto condo is a lot cheaper than San Francisco. That alone makes the pay cut easy enough to swallow. Either way I can comfortably live on a tech salary.

Starting prices for:

3 Bed SF condo: 1.2M usd

3 Bed TO condo: 0.7M usd (900k cad)

No rigorous comparison, just from me house hunting in both markets.

Let's not pretend that Canadian cities are a utopia for tech workers. Vancouver and Toronto are insanely expensive and salaries just don't compare to those a hundred kilometres to the south. Hopefully it steadily improves but I'm not hopeful with these tech companies having virtually an unlimited supply and no incentive to boost salaries.

I moved from SF to Canada. Traded a higher salary and basically 0 shot at green card for less money, a PR when I walk in and guaranteed citizenship.

Most importantly, you cannot do anything besides your job on an H1B. No start ups, no side projects. You can't even BE in the US without a job and just bum around for a year. Every interaction with the US border folks makes me feel like a criminal. The visa fundamentally restricts the shape of your life in a way thats hard for residents to really understand.

I already get paid enough to retire comfortably when I'm older and it's no fun retiring young! Retirement costs in Canada are also significantly lower if you can count on free healthcare. Not worth it. I do miss the weather though :)

As unfortunate as this is, I think this only applies to Indians and Chinese. I was surprised to see Yoluk did not want to bother applying to jobs in the US.

I am a foreign person from ROW (Rest of the World) in the US studying with F1 visa and trying to immigrate here via employment based options.

I have friends who also immigrated to Germany and Britain. The process is definitely easier and guaranteed there but for us ROW, the process does not look so bad to me right now. Maybe I just don't know how it should be.

After I graduate with F1, I can work up to 3 years with my OPT, companies apply to H1-B in that period. Some start the H1-B process even before you graduate if you have a bachelor's degree already. You have 4 chances in H1-B in the end.

EB-2 green card is also an option for us, as far as I know I can get that in less than 2 years. I've read about people who applied to EB-2 directly without H1-B and got that in their STEM OPT extension duration.

Finally, even though it is a slim chance, there is also diversity visa lottery. I have friends who got picked from DV lottery while studying here with F1. Everything became easier for them.

The US is still attractive to people like me, I don't think how this article portrays the immigration is true.

Toronto salaries are less than half than in the US for software developer roles. With the high cost of living, I dont know how anyone can live there.

As someone who did his graduate studies in Montreal and moved to NYC to work and then back to Toronto about two years ago I can comment on this. In Toronto I make about 10% less then what I did in NYC if you don't factor in exchange rate. But since I did my entire academic career from undergraduate to phd in Canada, I am able to enjoin a large amount of tuition tax credits which sort of makes up for it. This year I invested in some property downtown Toronto which I plan to hold onto, either living here or leasing it if I leave.

However, I think given the right opportunity I would still head back to the U.S. Things are fucked in the U.S. but the sense of scale, velocity is unmatched. In Toronto you feel that people's attitude is just not the same. There is no hunger or lust to be number #1 and I have always been competitive personality type. In NYC even traditional enterprise corporations (where I worked) there is an intensity and drive that's missing here. Call it the american spirit.

Salary as this stage is relatively unimportant, making 150 or 250k is about the about the same to me. But the scale and types of opportunities is something else. There are roles and jobs that only exist in the U.S.

That being said, for me going back is just a tour of duty, once you are past the journeyman stage of your life and wanting to start a family, then Canada wins unquestioned. The environment, benefits, healthcare, and most importantly education for your children will outweigh just about any salary you can command state-side. Because now you are talking about intangible things that are harder and harder to buy with money.

My opinion is, stay in the U.S. when you are young and/or talented. Then, if you are of Indian or Chinese birth, move elsewhere to start a family and take a senior position in Canada. Typically if you come from reputable shop state-side and demonstrate your worth, you can find a job where people will treat you with respect for that experience. They might not be able to compensate you the same way but you can usually get bumped up a notch.

If you are of white or European heritage and you are in a good place then you can consider staying the U.S. if you can make it work.

Raw numbers don't tell the whole story. From personal experience, Canada is great for new immigrants to get educated and started, but US always vacuums up the best talents.

Just like me. I did my BSc in Iran and was applying for grad school for cs 3 years ago. I just picked Canada because of easier immigration policy. Thank you Canada.

Canada gets immigrants from developing countries; immigrants take advantage of the excellent education and healthcare system, after a few years get a citizenship, a TN visa, then move to US for a better salary and a lower rent. USA gets the cream of the crop from Canada and wins. Canada loses.

I understand the article is about visa, but the salary discrepancy between the two is very large. I am sure many Canadians are moving to SV to double or triple their salaries.

USA-ian in Canada here. Been able to work remotely for US firms consistently for going on ~5 years here.

I hope these changes drive up tech salaries in Canada -- I fear they won't. Currently they're about 20-40% less than the US particularly due to the currency difference. Cost of living is also a bit higher, and absolutely insane in Vancouver (and a lesser degree, Toronto).

I suspect it will continue the H-1B trend, in that it companies won't pay better wages, just outsource to cheaper Canadian labor, who are in turn taxed higher and squeezed harder.

The situation is much more complicated. Many go to school in the US, work here to pay off their debts for a decade, then move to Canada for citizenship. Arguably, the US still takes "our cut" of the global workforce.

It also depends on where the immigrants come from. Chinese and Indians have the longest wait list, and therefore its natural for them to look for better options. They are right to do so, imo.

There's also the weather and cost, the large cities in Canada can be insanely expensive, with terrible weather, and salaries aren't anywhere near US levels. If your rent is 2-3k and you're making 100k CAD a year, it doesn't feel like you're living the dream. Want to buy a home in Vancouver or Toronto? No big deal, just fork over 1-2 million CAD for a 1 hour one way commute.

The quality of immigrants is a factor too. The US still sweeps up the best and brightest of academia and business.

I know more than a few Canadians (from immigrant backgrounds) that moved to SV recently purely for the weather and salary reasons. I wonder if when they get their citizenship, many of those in the article will be back in the US or moving there.

Just for perspective - green card wait for Indian tech workers in US is 100+ years. In Canada, you can permanent residency even before you land there

Anyone else from western Europe had their ESTA cancelled and had to apply for B1/B2 (non-immigrant visa) just to visit the US? It happened to me at the end of 2018, and it took me a year to get a visa. It's apparently going to be issued this week. It was stuck in Administrative Processing the whole time. The situation is eye-opening.

(And no, I don't have a criminal record, or indeed any hint of what I might have "done wrong")

In the last decade US stock market went up by 256%. All other countries grew below 100%. The outstanding performance of the US stock market was thanks to tech industry. Without the tech industry we'd all be poorer whether you work in tech or not. Anything that hurts tech hurts all Americans.

See charts here: https://medium.com/@petilon404/us-prosperity-is-dependent-on...

Taxes in canada are very high. The ontario income tax rate of 53.53% applies at 220K CAD. the equivalent rate for Cali in USD is 34.75%. you then have PST/GST (14%), way fewer deductions and european gas taxes. The one thing that is a good deal in canada is cheap high quality education. The "free" healthcare that you get is not very good and even the for pay services are of surprisingly low quality.

It stands to be seen how many of them will go back to US when the immigration policy becomes favorable. Canada is still plan B for high skilled immigrants. If H4 work authorization is removed, there will be a surge to Canada. Many US skilled workers do a soft landing to get their PR cards as a plan B. Canada should stop issuing PR cards for soft landers who are playing Canada's immigration system.

People who can be paid less due to being tied to visas/desperation may be a boon to shareholders but not to the job market for locals.

Companies that are nowhere near as successful as those in the US, developer salaries that are nowhere near those in the US.

I don't think I get it.

Might just as well say the same about every developed country's immigration policy. Last I heard, all accepted fewer than wanted in. If you perceive you can't get in one place you emigrate to another. Or stay home of course, making it also a boon for developing countries' tech industry (a very good thing, in my opinion).

The Bay Area is full. Voters certainly don’t want any growth here. It’s time for companies to move out of the bay area

This is really a terrible thing that's happening. We need the brains that are immigrating to Canada!

Why your company and employee didn't start H1B to green card conversion process?

Why did he go back to India to do that?

Was your company Infosys or TCS?

So, doing business in the US is only good for you if you hire non-US workers? Not a lot of sympathy for that, really.

Now is the time to leave. 18 years in the US with a kid born here. I missed the boat in getting my priority date around the time when my friends were getting theirs (my company was laying off people in other departments and my application got audited). Didn't think it was a big deal at that time. Now, my friends are getting their citizenships and I'm still stuck on a visa. I'm at the whim of the Consul officer and the CBP officer every time I renew my visa or come back into the country. Heavily vested here assuming I'll get a green card but planning to apply for Canadian PR just in case. There's an easy way to game the system if one is in the right situation and is willing to risk it. Leave the country and work for the same company for a year as a manager. Come back on a L1 visa and boom you can apply in the EB-1 category and get your green card in a couple of years. I've quite a few friends who easily got their green cards working for TCS, Infosys, etc. Meanwhile, with a Masters degree and 16 years of experience, I'm at the mercy of immigration officers.

Can't seem to edit although it's been <2h. Regret the typos.

For people looking for data backing what I'm talking about, here's[1] something that everyone looks at to track timelines. This data is released monthly. Search for "EMPLOYMENT-BASED PREFERENCES"

In that table you'll see China, India and Mexico specifically called out since they're the ones with such extreme wait times. EB-1 is extremely difficult to qualify for[2] so most people apply for EB-2. You can see currently applications from 2009 are being processed. That was more than a decade ago. Then consider the increase in applications each year since that year. That's where the 100 year figure comes from.

[1]: https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/legal/visa-law0/v...

[2]: https://www.uscis.gov/working-united-states/permanent-worker...

> Guess how much time it takes to get a greed card? Atleast 100 years. I'm not joking. Unless there's a policy change, there's no possibility.

Not disputing how ridiculous your situation is, but you do have a couple other options.

The most realistic one would be to save up all your money and apply for the eb5 investor visa. If you're making 6 figures, you should be able to save up the required million dollars in about 10-20 years, depending on how much you make, and how frugal you're willing to live.

The other possibility is you marrying someone who isn't born in India. If you did that, you can use your partner's country of birth instead of your own, when waiting for the priority date. But obviously this isn't something you can plan for, and I wouldn't recommend letting this guide your life decisions.

The last option is progressing your career to the point where you can mount a realistic eb1 application. I've heard anecdotally that it's very hard, but not as hard as people may think it is. If you work at it over a 10-20 year time frame, it may be very realistic.

On the flip side, if a U.S. citizen moves to India and wants to become a naturalized Indian citizen, just curious how long would that take?

> Guess how much time it takes to get a greed card? Atleast 100 years. I'm not joking. Unless there's a policy change, there's no possibility.

So my entire family migrated from India (not H1B though, so no idea what that process is like), and some are still migrating, and this is just ridiculous. Green cards and citizenship are issued quite regularly. I'm not going to say its fast, but it's not literally 100 years (can't tell if you were being sarcastic or not). My uncle got his a few years back, and got his citizenship this year. The system works, as long as there're no discrepancies.

I moved to Toronto, then to SF. Thought I'd also share my anecdata here.

I used to make ~100k/yr CAD (75k/yr USD) when I was in TO around 6 years ago. I bought a house around 7 years ago for 550k. I did a remote stint for a Boulder company for a couple years (~120k/yr USD working from TO), then moved to SF (~200k/yr USD + ~100k/yr equity).

I'm a bit out of the loop w/ TO salaries nowadays, but your 170k CAD definitely seems to be on the very high end of the spectrum.

A few thoughts:

The biggest difference in pay comes from equity. ~100k/yr is pretty normal in SF big tech companies, whereas equity comp in TO is pretty much unheard of unless you're a partner in a company. Caveat: not all SF companies offer liquid equity, or even equity that is worth anything.

Taxes are higher for me working in SF (largely because salaries of comparable positions are higher in SF)

Living costs depend a lot on whether you have a spouse and/or kids. A bunkbed in SF goes for 1.6k/mo if you're single trying to save up. In TO, you can rent a cheap room for $600/mo. But for families: 2 bed condo is ~48k/yr USD, vs ~24k/yr in similar distance in TO. Another very important point: in SF, a foreigner spouse's ability to work can be extremely tricky (e.g. spouse in non-tech field would often not be able be get a work visa sponsorship at all). Canadians can get a TN visa relatively easily, but the H1B visa required for other foreigners isn't guaranteed. Green card timelines range from 2.5 years to virtually impossible to get. By comparison, getting a work visa in Canada is pretty straightforward, and the path to permanent residence is also relatively easy, regardless of country of origin.

Preschool costs ~28k/yr USD per kid in SF, vs ~18k/yr CAD (13k/yr USD)

Healthcare in SF costs me ~3.6k USD/yr base (plus copays/other fees depending on how frequently I actually use it) vs free in TO. Dental and vision costs are similar between SF and TO.

Goods generally cost less in SF. Milk costs ~$5/gallon USD in SF vs $10/4L CAD ($7 USD) in TO.

IMHO: SF is better for saving up while young, Toronto gets pretty attractive once you have a piggy bank to afford housing/build a family.

It's a problematic comparison because few people in Canada earns $170K CAD writing software unless they are contracting for the government. Even then.

There are a few people lucky enough to 'make the deal' that you have.

Also, there are very few 'great companies' in Canada to work for, that can leverage high end talent - Canada is 1/10th the size of the US and spends less than 1/2 on R&D per capita. This is because Canada doesn't generally have the kinds of companies that are R&D intensive. Unfortunately.

I think most Toronto devs would happily move to California for a huge pay increase and a chance to work for a 'great company' whereas I feel few wold do the reverse.

I'm really wary of reading NPR articles like this because I feel they are basically playing the facts into a narrative of their political viewpoint.

How's the weather there though?

Can we just stop comparing cities? Everyone loves to complain about the cost of living in SF and always brags about how they could buy a mansion in the midwest.

No one cares. It's all about location. There is a reason why California is the most populous state in the union despite it being so expensive (weather and jobs). There is a reason the population in the midwest is so low (lack of jobs and weather mostly).

I recently sold my 2bd/2bath 1100 sqft condo in TO for 1MM CAD. No view.

IF you can find a 3bd condo it will cost you WAY more than 900CAD.

Would you have made the switch if it wasn't closer to family?

Everyone here seems to assume that salaries are the biggest factor and ignoring that for many the goal is to gain citizenship in a developed country. For them getting paid well and Canada and becoming a citizen in ? (how many years does it take?) is better than being paid awesomely and waiting decades for the green card lottery.

Language barrier aside, Montréal seems like a hidden gem.

Toronto may be expensive but it's not SF-level expensive. Salaries may not compare but you don't have to worry about basic things like healthcare and high-powered weaponry in the streets.

Those are just the top two–there are many other reasons to move to Canada than just money.

I keep being head hunted to work on SF/SV. And my reply is basically automatic and always the same:

"Due to US external policy and cost of life I can't see it being financially practical to move. Although, I would gladly consider any remote position."

I think the immigration complexity is the lesser problem there. My research based on housing, school, transport and food tells me it looks like absurdly expensive. To be able to even consider to move there I would need a salary bump of 3x-5x. No way this will ever happen.

  *  Sunnyvale, CA 
  *  Bentonville, AR  
  *  Bangalore, India 

I am in a similar position. Yes, you can work with OPT but apart from the very top companies and a few consulting shops, it has become much harder to get employment on it.

And from H-1B to greencard, you again need company sponsorship.

Canada looks good now because with Express Entry, you can become a PR relatively fast and from there within 5 years, you get citizenship. From there, getting work in the US as a tech worker can be much easier through a TN visa.

F1 makes things easier, but if you didn't come in as a student, things get much trickier. Most of the workflows you mention don't apply because it assumes you're already here to get your EB-2 or H1-B.

Even getting H1-B is challenging, especially as someone freshly graduated ("entry level positions do not qualify as skilled labour" is what the USCIS told me).

you seem to be naive. I'm actually on STEM OPT. you've read about people who got EB-2, but do you know those people ? EB-2 or O-1 visa usually require people with 10 years of experience and exceptional talent. e.g DHH shipping Ruby on Rails. But for the rest of us, your chances are with h1b, which is more luck than merit. And remember, with an H1B once a company sponsors you, you've difficulty transferring the h1b. It's almost as starting the whole process again. with h1b your salary is capped to pretty much what your company wants to pay you, not the market as you're pretty much their property. I'm one of the few people that has actually managed to get employed at 3 different places, while on STEM-OPT. And got my market rate pay, due to the fact I refused sponsorship. The US does have a point based immigration policy like Canada | Aus. they call it 'Marriage'. The government doesn't have to screen, you that much, their citizens do. That's why getting a green card via marriage is easiest out of everything. So yeah, my advise, find a gal | boy you want to marry while in college and get on with it. Otherwise, H1B is a non-starter.

> ____ salaries are less than half than in the US for software developer roles.

You can fill the blank with essentially any non-US location and it would remain correct. Nowhere in the world pays tech workers as much as US does, in absolute or relative terms. Most of the world, Canada included, has priced developer salaries close to engineer salaries. The US is the sole exception where developer salaries are priced close to doctor salaries. Let's not pretend Canada is the outlier—US is.

I am not saying US is wrong and the rest of the world is right or vice versa in figuring out the correct price for tech work. I am just saying that there are two schools of thought, one the US, the other the rest of the world, and I am sure both have good reasons for their approach.

To be fair you can rent a studio in a luxury condo (with doorman, pool, gym, curtain glass walls, etc.) for the price of a bunk bed in SF, around USD1600/mo. I know, I've done both.

Real estate is expensive to buy and salaries are low, though, that's for sure.

>With the high cost of living, I don't know how anyone can live there.

what's the cost of healthcare, childcare, and transportation like in Canada? I know this discussion personally because I've seen it play out between European and American tech jobs and I've seen a lot of difference in cost for raising children.

In Germany or the Netherlands good public education, kindergardens and so on set you back a few hundred bucks a month, I've seen Americans pay tens of thousands per year. Same for two cars that you don't need if you're an urban resident near a tech hub.

Rent control. When you compare income vs rent that you see on sites like Kijiji or Padmapper it shows rent for a new tenancy, but that's not what the locals pay.

> broken immigration system

It’s really not, though - the point is to only allow people who literally can’t be found anywhere else to migrate. They’re looking for one in a million, not just anybody with a decent education who’s interested in living here. The immigration policy was broken for decades and is just now being fixed. We should expect to see lower, but better, immigration.

The reason for the backlog is the US is trying to get a diverse set of immigrants to the US. Any one country can’t get more than 5% of permanent visas in a given year.

If it wasn’t for that, 80% of people getting green cards would be Indian and Chinese.

Agreed. I'm Australian and was investigating my options for potentially moving to the US to start a company in the AI space, and there's so much friction that I ended up deciding to just stay here. I can't see how they think these policies are a good idea in the long term (or even short term, for that matter).

>>The answer is that USA has dumb policies.

Oh well, yeah. That part is true to some extent. But I can only comment on things we have control on. And to some extent a system with some specific rules needs to be used the way it was intended. We can't exactly say, we have a right to do what we like(in this case, cheat) especially when these things work like resources in a common pool. I can absolutely understand if some thing like this happened less than a percent. But the moment you enter double digit percentages of abuse/fraud, you are just hurting every one else. Expecting the other party to just offer an infinite pool of resources to accomodate our doing just adds to the anti-immigrant sentiment that is going around. Please note there are also people from other countries here.

Beyond this. Every system needs to work with a degree of fairness and merit, immigration is same.

On the shorter run, I do see someone putting a fix to these things and making things harder for every one else just to stop this abuse. On the longer I can see there will be increased pressure from economic centers all over the world, because every one is fighting for talent concentration at one place. This will lead to more liberal immigration policies.

And contrary to what our American friends believe it's hard to believe they will be the only country with economic centers attractive to everyone. Paris, London and Berlin have a growing tech scene. Then there's also Singapore and Dubai. Canada is another destination.

Beyond this the Chinese Bay Area(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guangdong-Hong_Kong-Macau_Grea...) - Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area. Seems to be especially designed to take on Western Economic Centers. They are building state of the art infrastructure. Roads, Railways, affordable housing and top notch Airports. They'll be fighting for the talent pie, and with their demographics on the decline, attracting top notch foreign talent with be a Chinese government priority too. I don't expect them granting them citizenships. But liberal Dubai style 99 year visas on owning a home are possible. And a lot of the world talent will want to work there.

The way I see America will only eventually succumb to the pressure and might have to open up immigration again.