Justin Trudeau explains why Canada really ‘gets’ AI and smart cities
techcrunch.com
techcrunch.com
Then where is it's Silicon Valley? Why are Canadian software companies paying less than US ones. Why are new CS graduates moving to US? The immigration policy wasn't implemented yesterday. After all the decades of this immigration it should have had the same kind of growth as US.
Now in reality immigration probably has less to do with it and it's just used for fluff and PR. There are other incentives and constraints that are not aligned quite right.
Usually when a city or other government officials explicitly say "we're the next innovation center" or "here we will build the next Silicon Valley", chances are it won't happen. A few incentives or some token "city block transformation projects" are not enough. It might require a new tax or regulatory structure, but that's also hard to stomach politically and would make the administration less popular.
It's a lot of vague rah-rah PR between Trudeau (who is the master of that) and a major CEO.
Child has autism? No immigration for you. They have pretty severe criteria for immigrants compared to other western countries. After the '16 election it was all out PR stating how open they are to immigrants, but look how they have very quietly been handling illegal crossings.
The Canadian government deserves a lot of credit for this sleight of hand. They have been unbelievably effective in their PR.
No, I think you're wrongly mixing public opinion and public policy here.
Canada's reputation for being accepting of immigration and refugees comes from general public opinion on the matter. While some Canadians tend to align themselves with more modern socially-conservative American values, much of the country has moved on to realize the benefit to the social growth we see by expanding our viewpoints, and trying to make amends for historical transgressions.
Federal policy on immigration is something that your average Canadian is probably more out of touch with than they'd like to admit. It's a work in progress.
This isn't some PR gag. Sleight of hand implies you think there's some crafty, nefarious manipulation going on but I think you're either just jaded, misinformed, or misinterpreting the matter. I encourage you to spend some serious time in different parts of Canada to see for yourself. I've made many friends with people passing through the country on study or temporary work visas, and according to them it's not all that difficult to arrange. (especially if you're from a commonwealth country)
Also, to note: your line about autism is patently false. Conditions like autism will probably garner some further questioning and confirmation, but is not necessarily an immediate, flat-out rejection.
If anybody else is reading these comments, please don't take them at face value and look it up for yourselves. There's a lot of cynicism in this thread.
http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/resources/tools/medic/admiss/in...
Is that unusual? I would expect most countries with both public healthcare, and disability assistance programs, to not let people immigrate if they have a pre-existing medical condition that will either cost the public healthcare system boatloads of money, or will mean that they'll never be able to hold down a productive (i.e. tax-paying) job, thus putting them "on the dole" of the disability assistance program for the rest of their lives.
Not saying it's a nice stance—but it's the norm, not the exception, in welfare states, no?
That specific Canadian criteria is particularly strict compared to others. In the UK an immigrant is allowed in even if they may place a larger than average burden on health/social services (autism would be covered usually in this case), but may face rejection if they are highly likely to require "major medical treatment" or infectious. It is quite fuzzy, but far more liberal than the Canadian system.
> or will mean that they'll never be able to hold down a productive (i.e. tax-paying) job
When you look carefully at a number of Western countries, this is not as important as you think it might be! In the short/medium term (up to 20 years), many countries are not expecting the 1st generation to be anywhere close to net-contributors. The hope is to compensate for the major age demographic shifts in the west, 2nd gen. immigrants might be able to compensate for the huge welfare state. Of course, the 1st gen will also be eligible for pensions/social security/healthcare etc. It is a gamble.
Edit: Seems people are misinterpreting what I wrote. I'm referring to the public's view of immigration, not immigration or immigration policy itself.
As opposed to the US where if you are born from India, you have to wait 15-20 years for a Green Card due to country quotas.
Canadian immigration process assigns points for various qualities and qualifications legislature deemed desired and every couple of weeks x top scoring applicants get an immigration visa (pr).
If you want immigration due to diversity (which Canada dos) then it would make sense to limit based on country of origin, no? Otherwise you wouldn't get as much diversity.
H1-B is designed to just be a pool to temporarily fill labor shortages in the US. It's not intended to be the path for PR hence why it's admittedly arbitrary.
I still haven't received the actual card, and have been given no date, no tracking#, no interview, nothing. Just "your petition was approved..go back to your stressful wait because it doesn't mean much until you get the document."
In the meantime I'm not eligible for coverage under ACA, cannot be unemployed over 90 days, cannot leave the country, cannot work on anything to do with a defense contract, cannot risk commenting on politics on social media, etc. All this after I acquired a coveted O1A visa to move back in the first place, after 2 years of working on my company remotely while I was out of status.
This hasn't been "dead simple" as gp implies Canadian merit-residencies are. Not in the slightest. It has been expensive, time consuming and stressful. It's been a constant distraction from my work for longer than the lifespan of most startups in Silicon Valley.
I think that is incorrect. It is expected for F-1 students to move to an H1-B (which allows intent to immigrate) and then move to PR (usually via an EB)
Which means, if you are from India and are waiting in the EB2 queue, you have to painfully maintain H1-B status for 15-20 years.
It seems to me then the real problem is India's brain drain. I don't see how lifting the cap would be good for American workers or the Indian economy.
This forces people from India to stay on H1-B for 15-20 years, and prevents them from easily changing jobs or opening a business.
The process should be completely merit based.
Because... can I ask why, exactly?
In 2018, it will be the supercluster initiative, which is a well thought out strategy for commercializing the talent coming out of Canadian universities.
https://www.canada.ca/en/innovation-science-economic-develop...
Most liberal parties around the world are more or less centrist. The two aren’t mutually exclusive.
Then: it’s not up to the Canadian government to “pick winners,” but that instead that it is their role to say that they’re going to “invest in quantum, we’re gonna invest in AI
Isn't that literally the definition of "picking winners" - putting money in some specific handpicked areas? I mean, if you've got the argument for government investment in technology, fine, we can listen to it - but you can't in the same sentence deny it and praise it, it's insane!
TLDR: politicians duckspeak about being pro everything good and contra everything bad, informational content: zero.
http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/metropolis/2017/10/...
I know this is a serious risk in the future we should be well prepared for. I just hope the federal government doesn't try to step in to control it before we really understand what it's going to look like in practice and what the tangible costs are.
But having such a young leader is refreshing, even if I don't align with him on most subjects. The negative side effects of every global leader being in the 65-80s yr old range can't be understated. At least in terms of dealing with the future.
> he believes it’s not up to the Canadian government to “pick winners,” but that instead that it is their role to say that they’re going to “invest in quantum, we’re gonna invest in AI, we’re going to invest in robotics, we’re going to invest in high-value, innovative, creative, groundbreaking areas”
I personally don't see how these two things will be disconnected. At least in terms of how the various levels of Canadian government has invested in 'innovation' in the past. Which has often resulted in selective financing often to established firms well past the innovation phase, engaging in businesses better suited for private organizations (VC, office real estate, etc), and other direct investments.
That said Canada has been far better than the US in terms of supporting immigration of skilled workers and startup founders (my experience trying to immigrate to the US without a 4yr 'advanced' degree was nightmarish, despite 8yrs of experience, a solid job offer, and a US-based immigration lawyer). As well as a lower corporate tax than the US and fewer regulatory processes for wealthy angel investors.
I really hope 'investing' is being translated to "making the lives easier" of the entrepreneurs, developers, and investors. Such as making investing private capital into Canada, from the US (and elsewhere) less risky than other countries. Supporting contractors, not just fulltime employees. Helping small companies navigate complex regulatory systems without crippling their ability to compete with larger firms with teams of lawyers. Generating smart regulatory frameworks based in technical understanding of the problem, and not sensational news coverage and "something must be done" reactionary motivation.
Aka getting out of the way of companies doing the hard work and making the process smoother for them. Instead of pretending they can create pretend copies of successful Silicon Valley organization within a public structure by throwing money and buzzwords like 'innovation' at it.
Other than that, I don't think Canada gets it more than the US, for instance. Government is shooting money into AI now that they realized there was massive potential for growth, but I think it's still early to see how many Canadian AI companies will emerge from this (Element AI would be an early one).
Edit: I'm also not really sure what he means by "get it".
We have no atmosphere of innovation because our salaries are garbage compared to the US. This is the problem, every single time. Most of my Canadian graduate friends work for US companies, some remotely. We literally do not have economic reasons to stay here. No amount of lip service will ever transform 100k into 300k.
>“consequences of AI, the consequences of automation,” and the “economic imbalance of those who own the robots and those who are displaced by them.”
Wasn't this shown to be a meme? That automation has already been happening very slowly, it's not going to be some sudden iRobot level change. Example: as a web dev now you only need one full stack guy to launch a production app, does the job of the designers, devops, frontend etc through various tooling that helped him automate processes that other developers would have done in the past.
>Canadians have a tendency to travel, Trudeau said, and that results in a global outlook on how cities work and their different approaches to things like traffic and how people live in urban environments.
More like I can make 3x for the same job here.
I refer to my previous comment with respect to the waterfront, when will this tech bullshit be over? https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15550745
This all reads like crap propaganda without saying anything, just some nice meaningless buzzwords. Actually it's even worse, looks like a paid for advertisement by Google and they have Trudeau in their pockets using him as an advertising puppet.
Trudeau is a prime minister who was born into riches and surrounded by royal families since birth. This guy hasn't the faintest idea what he's talking about with anything related to real life much less tech or fucking AI.
Nobody wants a 'smart city'. It'll just be another data mining project except now they will literally be optimizing your entire life for their profits. You can't meme a city into existence like all those cute little renders. Cities/villages have to rise up organically and then be tamed and incentivized to grow, not built with extreme robotic precision using data from the ground up. At best it's going to be some hip little place with crap corporate chain bars for working professionals just like it currently is cause that makes the most money, anything else is a pipe dream. Completely sterile and devoid of life, like all these projects turn out to be.
>If the initiative proceeds, it would include at least 3.3 million square feet of residential, office and commercial space, including a new headquarters for Google Canada, in a district that would be a test bed for the combination of technology and urbanism. [0]
[0] - https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/news/toronto/google-sidewal...
Being a Canadian who moved to the US because the salaries were far higher than what I could find at home, I agree with the sentiment.
However, I think it's a bit more complex than: low salaries lead to no atmosphere of innovation. It seems to be a bit of a cycle. We have less competition than the mega tech centers in the US which leads to lower salaries, which leads to brain drain, which again results in less competition, and this is a cycle that continues. To break out of it, we need either a.) more competitive salaries, or b.) more companies to form, or move up to Canada. I can't see a.) happening unless there's a motivation to do so (why pay more than you have to?).
It seems to me, this is an effort to attract large companies such as Google and Amazon (perhaps for HQ2) with the hopes that this might lead to the formation of other small companies and startups splintering off of large companies. If this were to happen, and Toronto became a larger tech hub a la Seattle or the Bay Area, I would expect salaries to go up. I'm holding out hope that Canada will be able to increase its tech presence, and thus result in higher, more globally competitive salaries, but perhaps I'm being too optimistic.
Nobody wants a 'smart city'. It'll just be another
data mining project except now they will literally
be optimizing your entire life for their profits.
You can make 3x there? Why are you still here then? Instead of making up numbers, here's a more balanced opinion on salary differences between Waterloo and Silicon Valley: https://medium.com/@srlake/debunking-the-myth-of-higher-pay-...
Also I think it's funny when people position "number of startups" as an important factor. Just because your city has 30 five-man startups crammed into a coworking incubator doesn't mean I want to work for any of them.
I'm not making up numbers, just speaking from personal experience.
That article is extremely dumb. The title does not match the slogan. Is it salary or quality of life? You make way more in SF than Toronto, but your QOL might suffer because of exorbitant rental rates. That's not new information.
>To prove this, we are going to look at the money you can put in your bank account at the end of the year after paying taxes and living expenses.
We're obviously talking gross not net because net is subjective.
I know that silicon valley pays a fair bit, but cost to live there is also rather high. Is that true for most jobs across the US? I know developers in the US who are starting around similar salaries to myself, or lower in some cases.
I agree with the rest of your points. Was hoping this to be more interesting than it was.