Kids are not okay. New data shows Canadians under-30 'unhappy'
globalnews.ca
globalnews.ca
> A real estate market that's so stupid that there's no point in investing in other businesses
> Immigration at a level where we're adding the equivalent of our fifth most populous province (we have 13 - so no cherry picking) every year, while also having lots of social services.
> Immigration policies that make no sense. We went from having a strict system to people just gaming the system so that univerities and random industries can have access to cheap labor to keep the economy numbers looking good in the short term. Lots of people that use Canada as a stepping stone to the US or EU.
> Governments at all levels have absolutely no plans for any kind of infrastructure or fixing issues with housing. Local blames federal, federal blames local.
It's pointless to say since everyone does it; but for anyone on the fence, if you get a chance, just jump ship to the US for your co-op or something.
These immigration statistics make it clear: https://www.statista.com/statistics/443063/number-of-immigra...
This started after Trudeau was re-elected for the second time, but he has been consistent in calling for increased immigration. I guess he expected it to be his last term and decided to go all out. Of course, considering the timing (housing crisis and stagflation) that's a bad look.
By whom? Things aren't quite so bad now that higher interest rates has scared many people away from building, but prior to that contractors were booked up years in advance. There was nobody else to build more than what we were already building.
Sure, the old adage of "just pay the workers more" might work to attract more workers into home construction, but then the cost of housing needs to go up to pay them...
Perhaps the government could be more heavy-handed, only allowing immigrants into the country under force of building houses, but that goes against Canadian culture, not to mention that other industries who rely on immigrant labour would cry fowl and the Canadians working in construction will feel attacked. Not going to happen.
The only real way around it is to see Canada's job market crumble. When building homes is the only work available, then you'll see people begging for those types of jobs (Canadian citizens included). But when there is work elsewhere, most people are going to go elsewhere. Building homes is not exactly compelling work – at least not at the going rate.
I don't think that follows. Framing, drywall, plumbing, electrical work, etc., are distinct trades. I don't see how being skilled in these areas translates to employability in other fields.
It seems you've got your tech coloured glasses on again. Yeah, sure, you'll have 100 programmers lined up down the street. Comes with the high salary territory. But not so much in other industries. Try hiring for something like a cook. You are taking the first person that comes along, no questions asked. If you don't, you'll have nobody. And, indeed, cooking in particular attracts a lot of immigrants, not to mention many people looking to escape construction.
And who can blame them? Who wants to suffer the brutally cold Canadian winter hammering nails when you can thrill people with your culinary treats from a warm kitchen? I'm sure at some price point people would be compelled to switch over to construction – everyone has a price – but home buyers by and large aren't willing to pay that much. In fact, they endlessly complain they are already paying too much.
> I have no experience or education in the field
If you can build a house you can gain said education and experience. Still, kind of an obtuse example given the legal encumberments. It's not lack of education or experience that keeps you from becoming a lawyer – it is the supply management system. Not unlike why you aren't becoming a dairy farmer in Canada, even though I'm quite sure you could manage milking a cow just fine, you just legally can't do it without jumping through tremendous hurdles intended to keep you out so that those on the inside can maintain an artificially high income.
Housing is crazy in the US in many cities but there's a vast interior where it's still somewhat reasonable. There are lots of medium sized cities with sane housing prices and good culture and jobs (if you can't or don't want to go full remote).
The other problems are much less in the US. We have a stupid broken immigration system too but the US is so big the problem is buffered.
I've never lived in Chicago but it seems like a particularly good bet in terms of affordability vs access to jobs and markets. Atlanta, Houston, and Philadelphia also all seem to be more affordable than they should considering their access to jobs and markets.
It's getting worse all the time though. It feels like we have to hurry to buy or be left out. Everywhere is less affordable than it was just a few years ago.
The one advantage we have (and it's a big advantage!) is that since we've owned a house for a few years now we get to benefit a bit from the crazy rise in prices. Our place was originally 250 and now would probably go for close to 100k more. That amount of equity build up in 4 years is pretty wild!
Every time I see a story about economic anxiety and dissatisfaction among people under 40, I want to etch "housing prices" on a hammer and beat people over the head with it. Housing prices are the economic problem in most of the developed world. The economic problem, singular. Everything else is at least okay, and some things are great, but housing prices negate it all.
Canada seems to have this disease worse than (most of) the US. Not sure why. It looks like utter madness, especially since Canada has a lot more land than the US per capita.
https://worksinprogress.co/issue/the-housing-theory-of-every...
I think that article understates its case. Real estate prices are destroying civilization. So many other problems are downstream of real estate hyperinflation.
Unless you want to live off by yourself in the isolated tundra, the land anywhere close to civilization is highly sought after farmland. Farmland values is the even more interesting story in Canada, having increased at a rate eclipsing the growth in housing prices over the past 15 years or so. Cities have become so expensive largely because sprawling out into that farmland has become so much more expensive as compared to the historical norm.
There was a facetious comment that was flagged discussing that, as a HN user who certainly makes $XXX XXX, you can't be having a hard time. It is interesting, though, that even folks on HN (who I think it's fair to assume skew towards the higher end of the income distribution?) are also having a hard time.
Note that I mean interesting in the worst way. I hear these stories from folks of all walks of life in the non-metropolitan region that I live in, and I've generally just chalked it up to not knowing the upper-class folks (the ones making $240K writing client-side TS at MANGA). I suppose I'll now read about these same struggles of affording, affording kids, planning to retire, and so on here on HN.
Deeply Unhappy Gen Z and Millennials Cause U.S. Drop in Global Happiness Ranking