To be eligible you need to have funding from a canadian venture fund, see below.

I guess ycombinator could setup a Canadian fund and apply for the funding eligibility, but with the principles being mostly American and living in the US, I'm guessing it would be a very tough sell.

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/immigrate/business/start-up/eli...

"Canada to make skilled-worker permits easier to get in wake of U.S. delays"

https://beta.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/canada-t...

I wouldn't be surprised if those YC alumni were hesitant to make more bets on the startup roulette wheel. I'm not saying that venture capital/angel investing is gambling per se but most Canadians, even past startup founders, probably see it that way.

We don't need YC ruining Canada with hopped up "startup" bros. If we even need more VC firms (I don't think we do), let indie VC or something like it come up.

Edit: This isn't meant to mean people shouldn't start companies here. They should. But they should do it firmly grounded in reality, not based in SV VC world which has very little to do with building solid long term businesses.

As a Canadian who once got funded by YC and is no "\"startup\" bro" I wince at this comment, which is beyond inaccurate. So is the bit about solid long-term businesses—I can tell you from plenty of first-hand observation that you're quite wrong in YC's case.

Also - not really? The highest federal tax bracket in Canada is 33%. The highest in the states is 39%. The highest provincial rate in BC is 12% and that's about the same as California. I'm sure there's a lot of variation depending on an individual's situation, but you're really deluding yourself if you think American taxes are low, for the shit deal you guys get.

[1] California: http://www.bankrate.com/finance/taxes/state-taxes-california...

[2] BC: http://www.taxtips.ca/taxrates/bc.htm

[3] US Federal: https://www.irs.com/articles/projected-us-tax-rates-2016

[4] Canada Federal: http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tx/ndvdls/fq/txrts-eng.html

That made me chuckle. You think Canada doesn't have racists? Good lord.

And sure, if you just look at the income tax rates BC looks reasonable. Of course, if you look closer at the actual income brackets for each rate, it looks very different. That doesn't even include the sales tax (up to 15% in some provinces), taxes on alcohol, gas, etc.

Even so, we don't quite have the same legal system that seems to systematically lock up non-white people in bulk. A lower percentage of our population is in jail, they stay in for less time, and we have less violent crime overall. If you aren't white, I feel confident in saying you'll feel welcome here and won't get arrested for walking down the wrong street along at night.

[1]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saskatoon_freezing_deaths

By comparison Canada, much like Sweden or Switzerland here, feels like a pretty 'normal' country overall, much more reasonable in many regards. And it's safer there's no question about it.

I'm sure you could find a lot of wtf-grade police stories across the entire EU.

I was a bit emphatic because I'm considering the general culture, i.e. beyond (thus before) current news stories.

A couple examples. Keep in mind none of this is absolute, with close to a billion people involved in this comparison there's bound to be a bunch of counter-examples. My anecdotal and very subjective perception is by no means 'reality', at least not yours, not necessarily.

Ok, let's look at citizen <-> police rapport. Generally in the US, there's a very strict and quite 'robotic', not to say dehumanizing (perhaps both for the citizen and the agents...) process, which can appear quite shocking to foreigners --being forced to put hands on the car, etc. There is a very strongly enforced sense of authority (what Kelsen called "monopoly of violence" of the State, here materialized through the Police) in the way State-emanating agents operate and interact with the population in the US. To many european people, it seems a bit "too much", or too military-like, perhaps brutal or violent on a psychological if not physical level.

At the same time, considering the kind of shit that happened during the last century in the US (gangs, mobs, etc.), you have to understand logically why all of this has evolved as such; it probably was a response to a both very organized and diffuse menace. I'm not sure the intensity of crime has been felt as strongly in Europe generally since WWII, aside from localized places/events obviously (war theatres such as Serbia or Ireland, etc.) --again this is a very general impression of major cities during peace time.

That's actually another "thing" that sets aside the US from Europe: war. I can only speak from a personal point of view but it seems to me that the toll of war (how many young people become soldier, the whole challenge of supporting a large veteran population, the actual cost relatively to other endeavors, and perhaps most importantly the general culture that it brings to a society) is relatively heavy, at least enough to be felt, to shape individuals thus society on a high-level --it's not the end all be all of course, but it's something, it matters. I'd love to hear feedback, actually. If my country had been at war for essentially as long as I'd been alive, I'm not sure I'd feel as safe as I do right now in my lively coastal city in the south of France --a probable SF clone as far as the weather is concerned.

So I'm not considering the hype at all, I'm generally comparing these two continents, over the anecdotal and admittedly little perception 20 years of travelling infrequently between the two let me appreciate (from age 12 to now, 34, I must have spent about a year overall in the US, always as a tourist).

It goes without saying that the EU also has its fair share of 'wtf' moments, and the situation has degraded quite rapidly in recent years (especially in regards to racism and racial 'profiling' and everything it entails, regardless of the actual nationality of individuals --judging a book by its cover and all that). It also goes without saying that there are far more 'wtf' places in this world than the US.

To put a final nuance to all this, on a personal level I have no problem living in the US --all of this is cultural and I can adapt. I could also talk about hundreds of very cordial and even enjoyable encounters with the Police all over the States, I think that's the most common case actually. It's just that when it goes 'wtf', well it does so in a rather dystopic hollywood style... ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

It also serves to mention that your biggest life expenses are highly unlikely to be affected by sales tax.

You sure about that? Canada is, 78% white, 92% white + asian, only 1.2% hispanic and only 2.9% black. 700 million hispanics in the Americas, and Canada somehow only has ~300,000. The US is around 15%-16% black by comparison, and 20% or more hispanic. Sure sounds like it may be illegal to be non-white in Canada, how else to explain the lack of diversity?

The highest marginal income tax rate in California is 52%.

For that tax money, in Vancouver, you will also get free* healthcare.

In San Francisco, you will get... Actually, I'm not sure what you'll get. The biggest prison system in the world? The biggest military in the world?

* At the higher tax brackets, you will need to pay a $1,800/year MSP premium for a family, or $900/year for an individual.

https://smartasset.com/taxes/california-tax-calculator#IrgvH...

https://simpletax.ca/calculator

At wages of (All amounts are in USD):

$100,000 USD, $200,000 USD, and $400,000 USD, you will pay:

$32,000, $69,000, and $159,000 in taxes in California. $28,000, $73,500, $169,000 in taxes in BC.

But that's just income tax. There's also Social Security/Unemployment Insurance contributions. In the US, 13%[1] of your salary up to $130,000 will go to social security contributions. In Canada, 10% of your salary, up to $40,000 USD will go towards the CPP and Unemployment Insurance.

So, at the $100,000 USD salary, you will pay $45,000 in taxes in California. In BC, you will pay $32,000 in taxes.

At $200,000 USD, you will pay $86,000 in taxes in California. In BC, you will pay... $77,500.

At pretty much every tax bracket, you will pay more taxes in California, and get less for them, then you would in BC. As it turns out, maintaining twelve super-aircraft carrier groups is expensive.

Mind you, BC is not all flowers and roses. The provincial government runs the place with all the integrity and forward-thinking of a banana republic.

[1] Yes, your employer pays half of it. That money would have otherwise gone towards your salary.

Vancouver is, apparently, worse than SF.

While Vancouver, has the worst affordable city in Canada, it is very middle of the pack when you look at major cities in the world. And the notion that SF is more affordable than Vancouver is just laughable if you've lived in both places.

I have lived in both SF and Vancouver and I don't find it laughable at all. I also now live in NYC and have previously lived in London, UK. My experience may be anecdotal but it is representative. Of all the places I have just listed, I saved the least amount of money when I lived in Vancouver. To be clear, the amount of money I put away each month after all expenses was lowest in Vancouver.

In fact, the number of devs being recruited from Vancouver down to SF should be an indication of how much more financially attractive it is to work down there. I can't even imagine someone from SF choosing to make the move to Vancouver.