My dream is probably to get my sons to Canada,

[mmonk]

I do not look at Canada as some kind of panacea. I'd rather them live in a culture like Sweden or Denmark. However, I see us all going forward with "austerity" no matter who wins the presidency. I myself plan on voting for Obama and all down ticket Democrats. However I'm under no illusions who controls our political system. Therefore, besides voting, I will work outside the system with groups to change America back to a country where the citizens are on equal footing with the false god of the "heartland". the corporations and the rich. Thanks DU. You have been an inspiration to me. I will check in from time to time but my calling is to feed the poor victims of a corporate run America. I will try to mitigate the damage to everyday Americans made victim to our soulless corporatocracy in hopes someone will help my children as we give up citizen sovereignty for the corporate dictatorship with it's sick ideology of austerity.

Peace out.

[TrogL]

1. Immigration to Canada

http://www.cic.gc.ca/english/

[patrice]

2. Are they studying French? Last time I looked, there was a strong preference for French speakers.

[rationalcalgarian]

5. Not necessary

Unless Quebec is the desired destination. Elsewhere, about the only time French is preferred or required is if one is applying for a job with the federal government, then it's a definite plus.

http://www.servicecanada.gc.ca/eng/subjects/employment/index.shtml

Bonne chance á vos fils!

[arthritisR_US]

33. Are you living in Calgary? That's where I live,

the heart of right wing Canada? Love my city but the mentality can be a challenge

[TrogL]

36. I'm in Edmonton

It's not quite as bad here

[rationalcalgarian]

46. In the belly of the beast, as it were

But there is hope. My constituency sends a Liberal to Edmonton and a Conservative to Ottawa and the political attitude is showing a leftward trend recently. Not much, but it's a start.

[Canuckistanian]

44. No

It's never been a prerequisite for immigrating to Canada.

And especially now, with this anti-Quebec government.

[mmonk]

50. Will it help in points? Will it be a plus in other words?

[slackmaster]

3. I have one favor to ask of anyone who gives up on this country and leaves it for another

Please don't come back, ever, no matter how bad things get wherever you go or how good they get here some day.

We don't need fair-weather citizens here. If you leave when times are tough rather than staying and working to fix it, that is proof that you simply can't be trusted. I wouldn't marry someone who did that, and I don't want people like that living in my country.

[lunatica]

6. Oh please!

You sound like a right winger crying, "America, Love it or leave it!"

How crass.

[slackmaster]

7. I'm a moderate asking people not to selfishly put their personal interests over those of my country

Crass my ass. I remember this speech:

[southernyankeebelle]

26. Thank you for reminding us. Yes we must stand up for our country.

[argyl]

16. I've got a favor to ask also. How about you shut your sanctimonious yap?

[slackmaster]

18. I'm glad we live in a country where you are free to be so fucking rude without fear of reprisal

[Posteritatis]

20. You really don't have any room to complain given your introduction to this thread. (nt)

[slackmaster]

22. Who's complaining?

[joelz]

30. i left in 1971

for refusing to fight in an war base on lies i was given a chance to serve 3 years in a prison but chose Canada best move i ever made,i have dual citiszenship so have voted Dem. since Carter/Ford i have a family here so i don't think you have to worry about me coming back or for that matter marrying you but i do have lots of friends in the states and hope they can take their country back from the corporate insanity destroying the country.

[nichomachus]

32. What nonsense

A hundred years or so ago, my ancestors looked around at their country and found it wasn't so hot and wasn't going to get better any time soon. They came here. They did pretty well. They weren't "fair weather citizens," as you so snottily put it. They were brave and courageous and made a better life for their children, who may not have survived had they stayed.

Your attitude is an insult to millions and millions of immigrants who sought a better life in a new country.

[bvar22]

38. Check & Mate.

Perfect rebuttal of a bullshit post.

My wife & I came to the same epiphany as the OP in 2004.
We recognized that WE, as Working Class Americans, no longer had representation in our government. We stayed in the US, but sold everything and moved to a very rural area and started growing our own food. Had we known in 2005 that we would be mandated into the arms of the For Profit Health Insurance Cartel,
we would have tried harder to move to a country where access to health care is still considered a Human Right.

Anyone who chooses to move their children to a nation that values the old, traditional Democratic Values enumerated by FDR in 1944 has my respect,
because those values are no longer advanced today's New Democrat Centrist Party.

"In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established [font size=3]for all—regardless of station, race, or creed.[/font]

Among these are:

*The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;

*The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;

*The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;

*The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;

*The right of every family to a decent home;

*The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;

*The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;

*The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.

America's own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for all our citizens." --FDER

Please note that FDR specified the above as Basic Human RIGHTS to be protected and administered by our Government of the People,
and NOT as Commodities to be sold at a profit to the American people by Private Corporations.

There was a time, not so long ago, when voting FOR The Democrat
was voting FOR the above values.
Sadly, this is no longer true.

--bvar22

[slackmaster]

48. My ancestors bailed out of Germany in the 1870s and came to the USA for a better life

It worked out pretty well, and I can assure you nobody in my family would consider moving back to Germany no matter how good things look over there.

my ancestors... ...were brave and courageous and made a better life for their children, who may not have survived had they stayed.

The same is true of my ancestors, and perhaps of most people who presently live in the USA. My ancestors had their land in Europe taken away because they were members of a religious minority.

I doubt that the OP's children are at any real risk of not surviving here. It's really a false equivalence.

[CreekDog]

40. If you weren't fighting greater educational funding in our state, fewer would give up on us

but if I can't even get a Democrat to vote for increased educational funding and some tax increase in this state for *somebody*, then maybe...

it's not giving up on my country, it's that the citizens who are staying have given up on our children.

so they can have the things an increasing number of our children will be denied.

things you had, things you aren't paying for the current generation of children to have.

many people here are giving up on our children --those are the ones who are truly giving up on our country.

and when those kids grow up --if they repay you in kind, they'll cut your Medicare, Social Security, pensions and so forth.

you'd better hope they treat you in your retirement more generously than they have been treated in their childhood.

if not, it's going to be a cold set of golden years.

[slackmaster]

47. Natural-born Canadian workers have been paying into Canada's support system their entire lives

The OP thinks it's OK to change horses mid-stream and go up north to tap into something he hasn't paid for.

Meanwhile, his former state and nation no longer collect taxes from him.

In fairness to the Canadian people, if he does make the move he should stay there for the rest of his life so that he can at least partly back-fill the Canadian government's budget for his use of their education and health care systems. And it wouldn't be fair to US workers for him to move back in retirement and tap into our resources like MediCare, into which he would not have paid his fair share.

[slackmaster]

49. BTW, what is your basis for claiming that I'm "fighting greater educational funding in our state?"

I don't believe I have ever opposed funding education. I've consistently said that K-12 education should be California's top priority, and I have posted on many occasions that it's under-funded.

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

4. I hope you have some sort of demonstrable skill or trade education....

You know, they just don't take anybody up there....unlike us elitists pigs.

Also, shocked to hear they don't have the internet apparently either....oh well, good luck!

[JI7]

8. Does Canada Just take in anyone who wants to go ? how about things like job, a home etc ?

[ohiosmith]

9. What precisely do you think is so different in Canada? I lived there for twenty years. Do believe:

Canadian corporations don't influence the government, everyone has an acceptable standard of living, jobs aren't outsourced to offshore companies, the environment isn't exploited and destroyed for the sake of profit?

[slackmaster]

10. Interesting you should mention that. I worked for a Canadian corporation for five years in the USA.

I couldn't tell the difference between that and similarly sized US corporations I've worked for.

The subsidiary that I worked for was treated like a red-haired stepchild. The only thing the parent company cared about was return on investment, or ROI. Our Chief Financial Officer bent over backwards and ended up hocking some of the family jewels in order to meet the parent company's demands.

[ohiosmith]

11. I worked for two Canadian companies. Twenty years in Canada and ten in the states. There was no

difference in the way those organization were managed compared to firms I worked for in the United States. Profit was first and foremost. Everyone was expendable. I don't get the fascination with Canada by some here.

[slackmaster]

12. I must say that my personal experience with Canadian people is that they are generally nicer

At least there don't seem to be as many who are mean and dumb.

[ohiosmith]

14. I assume that you haven't been to Edmonton!

That's a joke!

[TrogL]

37. Hey!

[Arugula Latte]

13. The educational system is better, and you won't go broke paying for

college and healthcare. Those are two huge pluses in my book.

[ohiosmith]

15. It's reasonable for residents/landed immigrants. Not so much for those who do not meet the

immigration requirements. For university a resident pays around $5,000/year. Non-resident four to five times that. Same with health care. If you are not paying into the system you pay full boat for it.

When I lived there I paid more than 35% annually in taxes. It is higher now with the GST.

[Posteritatis]

19. Four to five times? Where?

Both schools I've attended up here, and any number of others I've worked at or near, have had a very consistent 100% markup for international students, but nothing past that. Maybe some of the screwier private schools which have the same problems American ones do, but a 4-5x markup for international students just isn't something that happens around here in my own experience.

I also don't pay near 35% in taxes.

[ohiosmith]

23. As an example my wife's niece went to the University of Toronto. An Arts and Sciences major

would pay about $4991 a year (Canadian dollars) as a Canadian citizen, but an international student would pay $21,344.

As for taxes, I can only comment on what I paid.

Where in Canada do you live?

[Posteritatis]

27. I'm in Nova Scotia and went to school in the Maritimes and Ontario

Only ever saw the doubling for international students, and in the Nova Scotian schools, at least as of four or five years ago, I'd only ever seen an exact doubling, even in one of the more expensive schools in this province. Maritime schools tend to have rather higher tuition than most of the others because our education budgets are so hosed - average here is about 50% higher than Ontario. $25,000 here would be a full courseload and room and board for an international student, and that's the general high end at most schools in the country.

If a school's going beyond that it's highly unusual, and I'll admit that UT is highly unusual in a number of ways for Canadian schools; they rammed through some financial shenanigans in the summer of 2005 that pissed off a lot of people and prevented me from attending there as a graduate student. (To make it even better they tried to bill me anyway when I declined their offer.)

[ohiosmith]

31. Interesting! Another example, UBC where my wife attended.

Tuition fee payment in Winter Session may be done in two installments. In general, the first installment covers tuition for Term 1 courses and the first half of two-term courses, plus most student fees. Visit the UBC Calendar for more details. $4,700 to $7,000 for Canadian citizens and permanent residents[1]

$22,000 to $26,000 for students on study permits

[slackmaster]

21. The solution to that is simple. Have the kids go to California illegally for college.

They'll qualify for resident tuition, which is considerably less than that for non-residents.

[Arugula Latte]

35. But if you gain citizenship, you're golden.

[Whisp]

17. that is true but

there are not as many crazy people like Akin and Bachman, (that alone is bliss) even taking in the population difference. As frustrating as it can be at times, our government works a lot better than the US's these last few years. I don't think any teabag takeover could happen here. I don't know how it happened there.

and Medicare. Not a chance in the world I would trade out Medicare for whatever it is the US has to offer.

sorry, don't mean to be down on your country, USers, but I get really tired of hearing how dog blesses america and americans are the smartest hardest working people in the history of the planet. I know politicians have to say that (because everyone expects it, far too many people become Texan with that).

[alcibiades_mystery]

24. Blah blah

Yeesh

[Hamlette]

25. Not me. This is where the fight is and I'll not let them take my country from me.

Here's the thing: right or wrong every other contry in the world is insignificant. So you get Canada to oppose a war or feed the sick. Good on you. But if you get America to do that, there will be no war and no hunger.

America needs a conscience and we are it. We need to work, and vote, and tut tut. If we all leave, or a significant number of us do, leaving the country, the most powerful and rich in the world to the likes of Romney and Cheney the world will be at constant war. There will be starving children everywhere. You can't escape it long term. Maybe you won't feel it but your sons will. Stay here and teach them how to fight and feel and care and vote.

Til the last dog dies.

(Yes, I did call every other country in the world insignificant. If you don't believe me I'll tell you a story. I was in college and went to stay with my sister who was living in the dorms at a universtiy in Denmark. The dorms had a better communal atmosphere and layout than dorms here and we'd get together with the local students to talk and eat a couple times a day. I didn't even know if Denmark still had a king but they knew the names of every cabinet member in the US and many Senators and some congresscritters. Even some governors. I asked them why that was and they told me "whatever the US does impacts all of us. Your wars, your economy, your production capacity, your reaction to the environment. All of it. Of course every educated European follows US politics." In Ireland we were talking to a history professor and he got tears in his eyes when he talked about Clinton. And in poland, the young man who gave us a tour of the salt mines compared Bush II to Lach Walesa. Unfavorably. He didn't like either. Both were too conservative and not very bright. He could quote both all day long. Change America you change the world. Run away, you change nothing.)

[grasswire]

28. interesting perspective, thanks nt

[MerryBlooms]

34. +1 With ya.

[grasswire]

29. today my teabagger sister said she is claiming her Canadian citizenship

....which she heretofore had not claimed.

So you may not be accompanied by a flood of teabaggers, too!

[Throd]

39. My dream is to get my daughters to fight all that bullshit right here in America.

[CreekDog]

41. Yours is a plea for a civilized country and in that measure, the USA is sliding

for a nation as wealthy as ours, there is more misery and lacking of the basics, which dozens of nations provide --and all have less money to provide it with, than our own, the most powerful and wealthy nation on earth.

i don't blame you.

i want to be in a nation where people place a higher value on taking care of each other's needs than we currently see here in the US.

i want to be in a nation where a presidential candidate who mocks the idea that people feel "entitled to food..." to be at 10% in the polls, rather than 45% or so.

it's is screwed up.

[realFedUp]

42. Now?

Where were you during Bush?

Moving anywhere else was the answer. But now? Passe with an accent.

[fujiyama]

43. I think it's a good idea

but I wouldn't encourage them to look at just Canada/Europe. Australia is another English speaking country with a strong economy.
australia and New Zealand also have something called a holiday working visa, which I regret not doing. It allows people in their twenties the chance to live and work there for like a year. I'd tell them to look at all international/study abroad options available. Latin America would be great, as would many parts of Asia. Obviously some countries may require certain language skills, but if they can attain these, that's a great advantage.

It's important to get different perspectives of the world. Perhaps, they'll find a culture or environment that better suits them, or maybe they'll figure that they miss home and they'll end up back here.

As we've seen the world is more globalized and interconnected now. And that's not going to end anytime soon. Canada is a good start. It's a neighboring country with a similar culture, but the government does have a basic safety net in place - not having to worry about going bankrupt due to medical bills is a big plus as far as I'm concerned. It also allows people more job flexibility and creativity possibly allowing them better entrepreneurial opportunities as well. However, it's worth keeping in mind that depending on where in Canada you live, the cost of living can be fairly high. For example, Toronto and Vancouver are two very expensive cities...

[pampango]

45. Nice post. It is also easier to stay in touch with friends and family while living abroad than

it used to be. When I was in the Peace Corps in the 1970's mail took two weeks to get to or from the US and international phone calls were extremely expensive for anyone, much less a PCV. Now with Skype and other communications it is cheap and easy to stay in touch.

Given the size of the US it is also likely that you could live in another country and be closer to (or at least not much further from) home than if you lived on a distant coast of the US. While you have visa issues to work out if you live in another country, you do get a different perspective on the world (and yourself ). Some will enjoy and want to stick with the new "perspective". Others will come to think that the grass really wasn't greener in the new country and want to return home.

I think it is better to attempt such a challenge as living in another country and culture, if you are running TO something rather than running AWAY from something. Depending on how different the new culture is, you can tire of the adjustments and new ways of doing things.