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Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by rapind on Monday July 22, 2019 @02:42PM (#20500944)
My belief has always been foreign capital (speculation) is bad, but immigration is good. So if you want to move here and bring all that foreign capital great! If you want to speculate or park money in Canadian real estate (empty houses and condos) that's really bad for the locals. It never should have been allowed.
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by jbay808 on Monday July 22, 2019 @03:57PM (#20501717)
Immigration would be great, I agree. One issue though is "astronaut families", where several family members (such as children) move to Canada, but the income-earning parents stay abroad and send money. Then they follow along when they retire.

This can really distort things, because it's a lot of foreign capital coming in without the productive industry and income taxes being present. Then later it becomes a social services burden.

Many of those kids do grow up to become awesome Canadians, so that's good though. But some of them choose to move back abroad after getting their citizenship and education, when it becomes time to work...

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by Tiktaalik on Monday July 22, 2019 @02:51PM (#20501061)
The reason why the Feds ended their version of an investor immigration scheme is because a study found that refugees ended up paying more in income taxes than investor immigrants lmao.

So yeah immigrants are great, but it has been abundantly clear that the rich persons buying citizenship are doing so just to have a passport of convenience and buy land as a safe investment and the gains for the rest of Canadian society from that are weak.

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by eps on Monday July 22, 2019 @06:15PM (#20502809)
Canadian investor immigration scheme required purchasing government bonds and holding them, but only for certain amount of time. After that time they could sell bonds and get their money back.

It was more of visa-for-a-loan program than anything else. Complete bullshit.

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by dsfyu404ed on Monday July 22, 2019 @03:41PM (#20501558)
>a study found that refugees ended up paying more in income taxes than investor immigrants

Citation?

I mean, presumably there's a citable study out there somewhere.

That immigrants in general pay in more taxes sounds plausible. That refugees are a greater net positive (taxes in minus benefits out) than investors, who are basically all wealthy enough to use minimal government services, seems like a stretch.

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by Tiktaalik on Monday July 22, 2019 @05:19PM (#20502419)
There's a bunch of articles if you google the right words, but basically in 2014 Jason Kenny cancelled the program because a Canadian government data showed that millionaires weren't really hanging around and contributing.

> According to CIC, investor immigrants reported average earnings of about $18,000 in their first year and just $28,000 after 15 years. After three years, only 47 per cent of such immigrants reported any income. The Canadian average is 67 per cent.

> Meanwhile, refugees (those who come to Canada under hardship) reported first-year average incomes of $20,000 and after 15 years those incomes rose to $30,000. Two-thirds of refugees reported income by their fifth year, on par with Canada’s average.

> After five years, only 39 per cent reported income, suggesting investor immigrants may leave the country (or declare non-residency) after the citizenship process is complete.

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/refugees-reporting-high...

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by damnyou on Monday July 22, 2019 @03:42PM (#20501564)
Sounds like a good reason to soak all the rich, not just the foreign rich.
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by vkou on Monday July 22, 2019 @03:46PM (#20501612)
Foreign capital, when it is invested in productive enterprise is good. It reduces the cost of borrowing money, which stimulates your economy, promotes value creation, etc. Assuming you believe that this sort of economic activity is a net good, that is. (And I think that even a dyed-in-the-wool socialist will agree, under the right tax system.)

Foreign capital, when invested into a limited, rationed, speculative resource, that is also required for life - like say, housing, is a ----ing nightmare.

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by TomMarius on Monday July 22, 2019 @05:18PM (#20502412)
The problem is not foreign capital but that someone thought that limiting housing construction would be a good idea
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by vkou on Monday July 22, 2019 @05:21PM (#20502436)
Vancouver, SF, Seattle are all going through unprecedented construction booms. There are more active cranes in Seattle at the moment then there are anywhere in North America.

This has not stopped housing costs from going through-the-roof. People are buying houses to speculate, new residents (foreign rich, or migrating techies) are buying houses with staggering amounts of money - amounts that existing residents could never hope to save up.

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by akavi on Monday July 22, 2019 @05:26PM (#20502475)
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by emanuensis on Monday July 22, 2019 @05:57PM (#20502686)
...only at the high end. There is still a rapid shrinkage of space for ordinary folk...
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by TomMarius on Tuesday July 23, 2019 @02:18AM (#20504818)
Why do you build houses and not apartment building like we do in Europe?
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by jseliger on Monday July 22, 2019 @04:22PM (#20501956)
that's really bad for the locals

Exporting housing services is a great business and a tremendous opportunity that is too rarely framed as such. https://slate.com/business/2013/05/exporting-housing-service...

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by andy_bandy on Monday July 22, 2019 @04:22PM (#20501958)
They don't pay income tax. In a country with free medicare and cheap post-secondary education, and many other low income benefits this is a massive problem.

"nine of 10 recent Chinese immigrants arrive in Metro Vancouver with enough money to immediately buy homes. But only half hold down jobs during their first five years in Canada, while four of 10 report they’re surviving on low incomes."

https://vancouversun.com/opinion/columnists/douglas-todd-how...

Ritzy Richmond neighbourhood where many are ‘poor’

http://www.vancouversun.com/business/Part+Ritzy+Richmond+nei...

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by mistermann on Monday July 22, 2019 @07:16PM (#20503161)
> But only half hold down jobs during their first five years

I wonder how long it will be before the government decides to change their data format so immigrant employment numbers can no longer be associated with country of origin, under the guise of "privacy" or something like that.

Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by msie on Monday July 22, 2019 @09:34PM (#20503766)
9/10 is taken out of context. It sounds like 9/10 of all Chinese immigrants but that’s clearly not true. Many reading it will be outraged and not investigate further. Mission accomplished for the opinion piece.
Re:Chinese are big customers for schemes selling foreign res... by msie on Monday July 22, 2019 @09:21PM (#20503725)
You are publishing opinion pieces from Douglas Todd, who is a syndicated conservative author who doesn’t like immigration. I wouldn’t take his articles at face value.