In What Country Would You Live if not Your Current Country?

[Ted Striker]

Just living and working in a tax treaty country is fairly simple if you earn under 100K US. You just file a 2555 along with your 1040, and it's likely you won't owe uncle sam anything. But if you have US investments and/or income, it gets complicated, and you would probably pay some taxes in both countries.

[evdog]

I'm curious to hear your opinion on significant cultural distinctions between the two. History, of course. Healthcare is big.

You get all of this in both countries but it seems a lot more pervasive in the US:
-conservative christian culture and accompanying politics, racism, bigotry and veiled intolerance that is so prevalent in the American south.
-deep seated distrust and hatred of government and the push for small government
-much greater aversion in the US to paying taxes to support social services
-Gun culture, especially among the paranoid and conspiracy-prone
-Things seem to be run by the corporations in the US, and consumers are on their own to look out for themselves. (For-profit schools, for-profit healthcare, huge influence of corporate interests in politics)
-Lawyers...the US is more litigious.
-Healthcare. Not just single payer vs the US system. But in Canada they pharma companies can't advertise drugs like they can in the US. Which maybe makes sense because Canadians tend to trust their doctor while Americans know better and can pick their treatment based on ads?

Canada just seems like it is a much more tolerant country. You don't hear much about abortion, baking cakes for gay people, or who can use what bathroom.

[Kenny Satch]

Dunno, greater Toronto area looks a lot like any US midwest metro area. Flat and lots of strip malls and chain stores. Shit, Canada is more US than the US in terms of fast food franchises. HFS, they are everywhere. My daughter and I described it as strip mall purgatory.

Sure does with exception of some gem spots like the Niagara Escarpment. Forks of the Credit River is now over visited with no parking signs everywhere.
Used to go all the time but now only weekdays are tolerable. If you know King City I used to live there but now it a shit show of over priced homes. I hate "progress"

[Sparwood Dave]

Another proof Canada is more tolerant - marijuana will be legal in the entire country next year.
Also FWIW the Crowsnest Pass is my favourite part of Canada. Less than an hour from Fernie and Castle, spectacular scenery and everything else outdoors.

[iceman]

By the ocean on the border between Maine and New Brunswick there is a pier. One side is in Maine, the other, New Brunswick. One day a tourist was visiting and he noticed two large baskets out on the pier. He asked a man standing there about them. "Oh that's where they keep the lobsters until they send them to market." the man said.
"I see," said the tourist. I notice one basket has a heavy lid on it but the other doesn't have a lid, why's that?"
"Well, the one with the lid is on the US side of the pier and the one without is on the Canadian side."
"Why does one need a lid but the other doesn't"
"The US lobsters are always trying to get free, so they have to have a lid keep them in."
"Well what about the Canadian lobsters? Don't they try to get free?"
"Oh, they do, but the other ones pull them back down"

-a joke heard in Maine.

[XXX-er]

I'm curious to hear your opinion on significant cultural distinctions between the two. History, of course. Healthcare is big.

well YOU FUCKING ASKED eh?

You folks rebeled against Britain had the big civil war which some say still affects/fucks up yer country while we still worship the queen and that is bigger than you think

religion eh? I just read something that sez >40% of folks in BC are atheists while I got you guys down thar pegged as a bunch of fucking religious fanatics, I mean why do people say " thots & prayers" you never hear people up here expect prayers to do any fucking good

GUNS, we got pretty reasonable gun laws up here while ... yours are fucked

we have very similar lifestyles/language/cars/chains of stores yadafucking yada its all a very similar north american market but canadians are 13th or so in world life expectancy while americans are way down the list at 31st just ahead of Cuba the counrty you have been embargoing/fucking over for 50+ years

I duno but I think maybe its just a lot more fucking desperate down there

I duno wtf you wana call robson it doesnt really matter cuz ... often you still cana see the top

[Kenny Satch]

I'm curious to hear your opinion on significant cultural distinctions between the two. History, of course. Healthcare is big.

We have BeaverTails

[carpathian]

I relocated last week from AK to Big Isle to spend 5 months developing a piece if raw property. Off grid , 3 min walk to ocean. Bought a car the other day, it will live here and eventually be rented with property air bnb.

Wife and 2.5 year old and 8 year old came along for ride.. Gonna home school.

Living off house turned triplex in lucrative ski town rental market.

Gonna get this property dialed then jump back to BC and retire at age 38...

[Kailua_Boys]

So you moved to Hawaii to buy up land to turn into an airbnb?

Sent from my Nexus 6 using TGR Forums mobile app

[carpathian]

What you do is 3-4 month rotation around pacific rim, brah

[XXX-er]

I'm curious to hear your opinion on significant cultural distinctions between the two. History, of course. Healthcare is big.

I'm just a fucking Canadian but Carp should have an interesting perspective as an American who married a Canadian and spent time living in the land of plaid & maple syrup.

[carpathian]

Xxx you want my opinion as an anti-Loyalist being married to a Loyalist as Kailua Boy wants to lecture me about my role in the post- colonial capitalization in Hawaii with in this post - normalized society ?

I guess any land I 'own' has been stolen from indigenous people , in lieu of that 'fact' within this post-factual Internet world of fake news, should I drown under the burden of guilt ? Serious question. But to answer your question didn't Billy Bob Thornton summarize Canada the best when he said it was like eating mash potatoes with out the gravy. Then Gian Ghomeshi went on and on about the absurdity if Billy Bob will at the same time re instigating the old ' we are Canadian, what does that mean ?' Trope. ( while Gian was banging his intern all along )

Or robin Williams described Canada like living up stairs above a really cool party and not being invited.

The ppl are nice and the women beautiful though, what more you need?

[Kenny Satch]

I wonder which side would have it easier transitioning to the other's country and culture... Canadians to the US or Americans to Canada?
I'm not sure which side would have it easier but maybe it depends on where you're from and where you go.

If someone from Bellingham moved to Vancouver or Montreal to Burlington would they have it easier being able to make trips back home? That would be a huge factor for me, save for some choice places in the mountains or San Fran.

[riser4]

I wonder which side would have it easier transitioning to the other's country and culture... Canadians to the US or Americans to Canada?
I'm not sure which side would have it easier but maybe it depends on where you're from and where you go.

If someone from Bellingham moved to Vancouver or Montreal to Burlington would they have it easier being able to make trips back home? That would be a huge factor for me, save for some choice places in the mountains or San Fran.

Right. Because I am not going to reverse that and move to Montreal given I don't speak French. I'll have to see what my daughter does when she is finished with UNB. She says she wants to stay in Canada. As a dual citizen she has that right. She doesn't want to live or go to school in Quebec, no idea where she will find a job. All I know is that Fredericton is a 9.5 hour drive from here. And since Christmas break is only 16 days, I am flying her to and from Montreal instead of driving out there twice in unknown weather. She'll grow to love or hate riding in those Dash 8s.

[XXX-er]

Air Canada will leave yer baggage off a Dash 8

I had a manager who was a canadian married to an amercian, he was a lifer at IBM working in Canada, she worked in America he comuted to his home to across the line to America every day, he did that in vancover and back east (pre 9-11) so at coffee break everyone would ask him what the difference was money wise and he couldnt give a definitive answer ... said it was a wash

Not really a loyalist and i'm just kidding about worshipping the queen but actualy until the constitution was signed in 1982 Canada was technically still a colony of Britain and so its definatly part of the Canadian heritage , it wasn't that long ago you could wander into the Empress hotel in Victoria for tea and crumpets and be surrounded by a bunch of ex-pat brits

In his memoirs Trudeau said the queen favored Canada becoming independant

[riser4]

Air Canada will leave yer baggage off a Dash 8

I'll warn her. She was planning to travel with only carry on. Direct flight. And this way she won't be bringing home a semester's worth of laundry. She can wash it on campus out of her own budget.

[XXX-er]

As AC configures a dash 8 around here it can not carry all the passengers and their luggage SO they will leave off checked baggage

pisses off skier hunter fisherman first timers, the guide I was picking up said "they have left my skis off so many flights I don't even care anymore in fact it saves me having to carry them into the hotel and i just get my skis delivered straight to the heli base the next am "

[Ted Striker]

I wonder which side would have it easier transitioning to the other's country and culture... Canadians to the US or Americans to Canada?

I've lived in both. Canadians tend to think there's a bigger culture shock than there really is between the two countries. Americans tend to not think about Canada at all.

If someone from Bellingham moved to Vancouver or Montreal to Burlington would they have it easier being able to make trips back home? That would be a huge factor for me, save for some choice places in the mountains or San Fran.

If someone moved from Calgary to Vancouver, or Montreal, or St Johns they'd have a culture shock (ESL in all three, lol). Same goes for Los Angeles > Kansas City > Miami.

I live in Bellingham, and there are a lot of cross-border couples/families here.

[XXX-er]

. Americans tend to not think about Canada at all..

this ^^ IME , i would talk to help desks in the US that were absolutley clueless about whats up here in the great white north, in terms of basic geography, I couldn't pickout all 50 states (51 if you count canada) but I got rough idea where they are

[Ted Striker]

I used to be able to name the 10 provinces and 2 territories, but then you went and changed them!

[stuckathuntermtn]

this ^^ IME , i would talk to help desks in the US that were absolutley clueless about whats up here in the great white north, in terms of basic geography, I couldn't pickout all 50 states (51 if you count canada) but I got rough idea where they are

And DC too?
I heard you guys speak English up there. That would make the transition easier.

[XXX-er]

I've had people ask "where are you ?" I'm calling from BC "wheres that?"

AND I know where Worshington is

both of them

[stuckathuntermtn]

And you have the same kind of phone numbers and shit like that, right?

[BmillsSkier]

this ^^ IME , i would talk to help desks in the US that were absolutley clueless about whats up here in the great white north, in terms of basic geography, I couldn't pickout all 50 states (51 if you count canada) but I got rough idea where they are

No fucking way you know where Arkansas is.

[PNWbrit]

No fucking way you know where Arkansas is.

To be fair though most Arkansans don't know where it is either.