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Comment by turnip1979 | Hacker News Reader

turnip1979

Agreed on the brain drain. Toronto is a major (and expensive) world city. From talking with friends, 100K (Canadian, that's 70K US) is the ceiling for intermediate to senior developers. Junior devs make a lot less ... 50-60K (that's 35 to 42K US)!

That said, free healthcare counts for a lot. Also, as a dev in a Canadian tech company, you are probably not going to see as much stress and volatility as your average Silicon Valley company.

The high property prices are messing up lives of young people who don't have rich parents. In my friend circle, I can see it as a key source of strife among married couples. Buying a house ties you to a city .. even if you get a better offer some place else. I don't think real-estate is being recognized as the beast it is. The last Bank of Canada rate decrease seemed only about oil prices and oblivious to the flames in YVR and YYZ housing.

Sigh ... what a mess :(

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Having worked in Toronto's tech scene for almost two decades I just have a big 'meh' response to it.

I now work at Google in Kitchener, and commute from a hobby farm near Hamilton. Quality of life is outstanding. I dread ever having to work in Toronto proper again.

The startup scene in Toronto is a clique. The quality of management talent is sad. After working as employee #4 in a Toronto startup, I jumped ship to work for a late stage startup HQ'd in NYC and the contrast in their management skills and treatment of employees was night and day. Working at a 'hip' company in Toronto they expect you to feel blessed and to take intense sacrifice on their behalf just because you have the privilege of working for something that isn't a bank or insurance company. Meanwhile compensation lags significantly behind what you'd get elsewhere in NA.

And then the rest of the non-startup scene in Toronto is primarily large financial companies, and the work is soul crushingly boring.

As a Toronto-based startup founder, I'm sorry you had that experience! (Shit, how Canadian of me... Apologizing for other people)

In any event, I think for the first time there's a really good cohort of Toronto founders with American-style vision and ability to execute. I don't think we're too far from seeing a couple of unicorns in Toronto that will help to build a stronger ecosystem. And yes, where necessary that means importing American management at great expense.

Toronto has a lot going for it. It's not everyone's cup of tea, as you can attest, but I think it's as good a place as anything to do something great.

With the CAD being low there might be a window where a lot more American capital invests here. Until the price of oil climbs again.

In general it seems like VC-funded companies that go through acquisition here get a far weaker deal than similar companies in the US. And the employees a lesser share of the pie. Maybe that's changing now, but unless the capital is there to invest, I can't see how.

It's improving. The capital is there, you just have to think globally fairly quickly.

We can always whine about how things in Canada are never as good as in <x>, in this case the Valley, but overall it's actually pretty good. I guess the secret sauce is to just get on with doing what you'd do regardless of your circumstances. I personally am not motivated by whether or not I'd get a 30% boost on an eventual exit if we were in the US.

As an employee trying to pay off a mortgage and save for my kids uni, that 30% is important to _me_. So for recruiting good talent (not claiming I'm good talent, but whatever) I'd think it matters a lot.

I think the Toronto scene is the strongest I have seen. A lot of great companies doing exciting things and growing fast.

I worked across Toronto, Markham and now in Guelph bordering on Kitchener. Just the chaos, traffic and costs alone are worth not working at Toronto. I believe that my commute mirrors yours quite a bit, since I commute from the same area.

Having said that, I have references that Wattpad in Toronto is a great place to work. I believe that every place is quite unique and there are diamonds to be found amongst the rough.

$100k CAD is not the ceiling. Far from it. I've personally extended offers for $120k, and that was for a pre-series A startup. The larger guys pay even more. First company that comes to mind, Shopify, pays up to $150k:

https://angel.co/shopify/jobs/88003-software-developer?utm_s...

And it goes up from there, especially once you start looking at positions that include less sexy startups, less common technologies, or more responsibility (like being a team lead).

My data is from before Shopify's success ... I think you are right that Shopify might be helping to raise salaries (to be fair, their post says 70K to 150K). I'm curious .. the 120K offer, how experienced was the individual (in terms of years, etc.).

Just saying, average house price in Toronto is 1 million. It should not cost 10x a dev's income to buy a house in Richmond Hill. In the Bay area, total comp of 400K is not unreasonable ... that makes the 2.5 million dollar homes in MV seem reasonable ... an uncomfortable 6.25x of a dev's income.

Just putting this out there that I personally make >$120k as a developer in Ottawa, and I doubt I'm all that rare seeing as there's people at my company with a more senior job title than I have.

I don't think Shopify being in town has anything to do with that, just that the ceiling is higher than you may think.

you're not rare, but I don't think you're common. I make <$55k as a dev in Ottawa and it doesn't feel surprising.

I have no idea really, I only have my own experience to go by. But it sounds like you're really being underpaid. That's very low for a developer unless you're still in school or something. I know that I made $52k as a co-op student in 2009, for example, and I believe that was standard pay at the time.

if you look into the tax code, you pretty much max out at 150k. if you go higher, the tax rates eat all your wages alive.

That salary ceiling is definitely one of the reasons I left for the states. Funny thing: that article goes to pains to point out that foreign investment into Canadian housing is a big issue, and I'm now watching the Toronto market, with the depressed exchange rate and looming recession, wondering whether I should turn around and buy property as an investment. There are tricky factors surrounding when and what to buy, but it could be sound over the long term, considering that the city is a seat of power for government, finance, and healthcare.

>wondering whether I should turn around and buy property as an investment

Why would you do this? There's been nothing but talk about a housing bubble, especially in Vancouver and Toronto. This seems like the worst possible time to buy property there, especially if you take any debt to do it.

Buy after it bursts, when prices collapse.

Yeah, reading this just makes me think that now is when I should be saving up to buy in Vancouver and return home.

This has been the talk for many years now. I know people who have been waiting for the bubble to burst, and now have absolutely no chance of ever getting into the market.

And if someone bought three years ago, and paid property tax, maintenance, interest on debt and all other fees, etc....what has their return been?

I doubt it's very much, and they've got major downside risk.

How well do you know the Vancouver market? The returns in the last decade have been stunning.

My brother sent me this chart earlier today:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/incoming/article26200269.ece/...

I'm estimating since the chart isn't precise. It looks like, from 2013, the average change is:

single family home: 1.1 million --> 1.4 million = 8.37% return

condo: Hard to tell. Not as large.

Am I reading that chart right? Of course, that doesn't tell you the increase in price in existing homes. And that return rate comes with interest, fees, property taxes, maintenance and the massive downside risk if we're in a bubble.

This is a very rough calculation on my part, so let me know if it's wrong.

That said, as to the original question, which was whether someone should invest now: With the massive economic slowdown + the large drop in Calgary real estate prices, this seems like a particularly bad time to invest, even if it might theoretically have been better a few years ago.

> Free healthcare counts for a lot

It's not really better than the inexpensive healthcare that comes with any good job in the US. If your choice is between $70K with free healthcare, and $120K with inexpensive healthcare, I know which I would pick.

> That said, free healthcare counts for a lot.

If you're young and childless, it really doesn't.

I was going to say the same thing. Most SV companies have very good benefit packages where the cost of healthcare is pretty minor compared to salary.

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