Google's expansion plans show why Canada's tech boom is here to stay - <AUTHOR> https://www.cbc.ca/news/business/google-canada-expansion-analysis-1.5455122 <comment><USER2> Tech salaries in Canada are very low and I really hope this will raise the bar for everybody. Most of the talent (outside of Quebec) migrates south of the border at some point, because it makes no financial sense to stay. Innovation outside of Toronto is low/inexistent and it is hard to get funding. I am always amazed when founders make the national news here when they raise 1-2M$ CAD. At the same time, you have CEOs complaining that the video game industry is poaching dev unfairly (because the salaries are subsidized) instead of raising their own salaries... It really is a sad state. It might be due to the fact that we have a culture of small/medium businesses that are very slow to adopt new technologies and a mentally of what we called in french "born for small bread". At the same time, since nobody is really making a lot of money you also have a more equal society leading to a better quality of life IMO (less crime, more generosity, etc).

As a new grad myself, I am in this situation where I get offers of >120k USD if I move to SV with a growth potential (both in technical and financial terms) far better than what I can get here. In Quebec (where I live), I saw most of my peers stay around and accept salaries ranging from 65k CAD to 80k CAD (50k-61k USD). From what I know, an average senior can expect 120-130k CAD in Montreal. The only way to make more is by being a consultant, which is why you see a lot of them around here (for better or worse). I would feel a bit guilty to move to the US right now considering I got basically a free education and I do want to contribute back to society.

<comment><USER3> I just love to hear this.

/sarcasm on

With 26 years in software development, low level linux (kernel "stuff") and low level windows (kernel "stuff" again), with work including from analyzing malware to writting DRM that was left unbroken for 3 years, to high level software, system administration on various unixes and unix like beasts, including low level networking, fluent in c, c++, asm x86/64, go and some "stuff" I am not proud off (c#, java, python, js, php), expirience in management, team leadership, working for bluechips, US three letter agencies and army (as a part of my previous jobs), annoyingly proficient in security (..., there is more, but who cares) I earn 24k netto euros a year and consider myself lucky, due to a fact that I cant move to another country based on broken marriage and my wish to still parent my kid every second week. Oh, you have 120k salery? I wouldnt complain if I were you.

/sarcasm off

Just my 5 cents, Instead of counting the money, concentrate on what makes you happy. You will pass better on long term. At the end there is not much you can take into grave. And money certanly doesnt make it softer.

<comment><USER4> Your advice at the end is good but I would add that you shouldn't let others take advantage of you.

People aren't being paid $200k-$2M / year for reasons of charity. They get paid that much because their contribution to the company is higher than that.

<comment><USER5> _> Your advice at the end is good but I would add that you shouldn't let others take advantage of you._

Everybody is being taken advantage of if you think about it, especially if you're a salaried employee.

Hell, if you ask Googlers earning $600k they'll think they're being taken advantage of. If you ask CEOs of F500 companies they'll also think they're being take advantage of. If you ask Multi-Billionaires with offshore accounts in tax havens to pay their fair share of taxes, they'll also think they're bein taken advantage of.

If you let this way of thinking drive your life, you'll end up very miserable.

<comment><USER4> > Everybody is being taken advantage of if you think about it, especially if > you're a salaried employee.

I disagree.

If you think every employer is going to take advantage of you, then you should start a business and become self-employed.

I'm very happy working where I do. I'm well paid and genuinely like the people I work with. I've been here for 20 years now.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I often see people framing the US & Canada primarily as a competition in tech. The exact opposite is largely the case. The US benefits enormously from having a wealthy, vibrant Canada, including in its tech sector. We're permanent allies, liberal democracies and share a very large border as well as $600 billion in goods trade. The ability for technology, labor, products, services and capital to freely flow back and forth between the two of us makes us both far better off. Canada prospering in tech, rather than taking away from the US, brings more to the US-CA economic zone, including any talented persons they import that the US doesn't. There is more than enough tech riches to go around, the US doesn't need to own everything and shouldn't try to.

If anything the US should be directly helping Canada to boom in tech. Enlarge the regional blackhole, suck up all the world's talent. They're our largest export market, the richer they get, the more people they have, the more US exports they are likely to buy (and vice versa). Canada's tech talent will occasionally also go south and start companies in the US. Canadian investors can fund US start-ups from their successes. US investors can back Canadian start-ups and public companies. The more the merrier.

<comment><USER7> Most people in this field are leaving to the US. It's surprising how many. See [https://s3.amazonaws.com/chartprod/Lb7EHT9ksyZyjHqo5/thumbna...](https://s3.amazonaws.com/chartprod/Lb7EHT9ksyZyjHqo5/thumbnail.png).

I am in a Canadian software engineering program right now, and it is a goal of many people here.

Source: [https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/technology/article-...](https://www.theglobeandmail.com/business/technology/article- canada-facing-brain-drain-as-young-tech-talent-leaves-for-silicon/)

<comment><USER8> I graduated in 2000 from Computer Engineering (in Canada). A solid fraction of my peers ended up in Silicon Valley. It's not just for the wages. Silicon Valley just where most of the jobs are and it remains the best place in the world if you're an engineer.

<comment><USER9> The grass is always greener, I guess. I'm a software engineer from the US and I'd never move to SV in a million years. There are more things in life than money.

There are so many cities here with better quality of life and lower cost of living.

<comment><USER10> Quality of life is subjective, and there are no cities that offer as much financial and career opportunity to the average senior software developer as SV does right now. Yes, cost of living is high, but you'll still come out far ahead the average senior software dev living in some midwestern city. There are exceptions / edge cases, but they're just that.

<comment><USER9> > _you'll still come out far ahead the average senior software dev living in > some midwestern city_

Come out far ahead how?

I'm already pulling close to 6 figures, and I expect to reach $120-130k in a relatively short time period. Do I -need- to move to SV and live in much shittier conditions and have an insane cost of living just to earn some more money? ... I feel that remote work makes this an outdated concept (my company is fully distributed).

I'm almost 24 and if I continue to manage my finances correctly, I should have my own spacious home by 25. I'm in South Carolina, but there are plenty of other reasonable places in the US. The money that I don't have to spend on high cost of living goes straight to my savings. I get that my situation is atypical, but it's absolutely possible to have a great life and earn great money while not living in SV. If I ever feel like I need to earn more money, there's nothing stopping me from creating my own startup, etc.

I guess I'll never have the "prestige" of working in SV, but I seem to do just fine by going to conferences and networking.

<comment><USER11> > Come out far ahead how?

Check out levels.fyi. Moving to the Bay Area to work at a random startup makes little sense, but moving to one of the BigCos can be very financially rewarding.

> I'm almost 24 and if I continue to manage my finances correctly, I should > have my own spacious home by 25

Check out this comment someone made complaining how high the CoL is in the Bay Area, even for someone making $300k. [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22228756](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22228756) Their analysis is flawed and overstates expenses, but even then this hypothetical tech employee saves > $110k/year (including a 401k and match). That's enough to put a down payment on a house in SC _every year_. If you're investing minded, you could own an apartment building in about 10 years and never have to worry about money again.

<comment><USER9> That's certainly compelling, but it still comes with huge downsides like lack of space, having to live with roommates, not having any family nearby, not being able to work fully remotely, likely not having a healthy work-life balance, etc.

If I weren't working remotely, this would be more compelling I think.

<comment><USER10> Lack of space is subjective, you certainly don't have to have roommates if you make $300k, and work/life balance is above average at many of these companies. That said, remote work is more rare, and flights from SF to SC to visit family are a pain.

I think the bigger issue for many people is probably cultural. I've loved my time in SF and NYC because I love cities, am fairly liberal-minded, don't mind small living space, and don't really care about living near extended family. Working remotely from a sprawling home in a small town near family is the opposite of what I want for my life. YMMV!

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER12> As a Candian, it seems to me so very pathetically and predictably Canadian to literally herald the surrender of your own industries to foreign takeover.

Canada is (often) to tech what Mexico is to cars.

Mexican 'assembly' of cars is fine and good, but they don't exactly move up the value chain from there.

Canada produces a lot of decent tech people, who will work for 2/3 the wages, unfortunately, this doesn't map to a successful entrepreneurial climate. Now, that's a hard thing to contemplate, as 'nobody' can really compete with SV at their own game, but it's disingenuous in the least to farm out labor and compare that activity with those doing much of the higher-level work, and most importantly: controlling the profits.

Maybe the Mexico analogy goes a little bit too far, as there are tech startups and a few decent companies in Toronto, by and large, but they have serious trouble scaling into anything. To be fair, it's not like most US cities are any better. In fact, aside from the weather and lack of charm, Toronto is a 'better all-around city' than most American cities.

But there's a serious lack of exceptionalism, and far too many of Toronto's best move on to the US, London, or elsewhere.

This kind of 'pathetic nationalism' is why loathe the CBC. It's as though they are utterly unaware of the extent to which they extoll mediocrity.

Canadians are well educated, get along pretty well, and the 'average person' in Canada in many ways lives better than the average American, at very least there's a lot less calamity, fraud, there's full healthcare which isn't great but it's mostly good.

But - on the issue of talent and exceptionalism, it's a disaster. We are near the bottom of the OECD it talent and R&D expenditures. Canada sends China 'raw materials' and they send us back finished goods: this is the opposite of 'first world/developing world' trading norm.

We should not be hailing mediocrity as a victory. It's nice to have jobs, but there is no Valley of the North.

<comment><USER13> Canada is already nearly as big as Mexico for cars: [https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_car_exp...](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_car_exports)

I'm not sure why you're upset with the CBC over this, we've been a branch plant economy since the 1960s. A lot of this has to do with Canadian temperament and mindset, which isn't particularly entrepreneurial due a dearth of leadership from its investor class.

There have been many tech darlings out of Canada over the years (top of my head - Shopify, Hootsuite, Flickr, Matrox, ATI, BioWare, Eidos, iStockPhoto, Nortel, Corel, BNR, Cognos, Delrina, Hummingbird, Newbridge, Jetform, RIM/Blackberry, OpenText, Mitel, Newbridge networks, QNX, Sierra Wireless, SMART technologies, Redknee, PointClickCare, Solace) but often a reasonable exit lies with pools of capital outside of the country such as IPOing in the US capital markets.

Which gets to my confusion over your complaint. The problem with Canada over the last 50+ Years is that its capital holders are extremely risk averse and largely old money. That's changing with recent funds, but it takes time for that to lead to improved VC and other funding. But we see this problem in every industry. A major chunk of Canada's Oil and Gas interests for example are owned by foreigners. I'm not sure what your suggested approach is — Government subsidized entrepreneurship? We already have that to some degree.

Even in the USA we are increasingly seeing grads taking the FAANG paycheque instead of doing a startup. The stress and market barriers are too high to make it worthwhile relative to the alternative of making $150k at age 22.

<comment><USER14>
      I'm not sure why you're upset with the CBC over this

Not just the CBC, but they do it a lot. There is this cloying "we've finally made it!" back-slapping the press reliably produces every time a well-known company announces an expansion, no matter how big or small, and really any time some positive PR comes out of the Canadian tech sector. The energy we spend congratulating ourselves for a job well done unintentionally lays bare how provincial we really are.

The reason this is so infuriating is the congratulatory rhetoric rings hollow for many Canadians with US work experience who realize how much better it is, in so many (but not all) ways, to be a tech worker in the US vs. in Canada.

To produce articles with the tone of the OP, you would need to be either myopic or disingenuous.

This is _especially_ so in the context of a company like Google. If you're a Canadian engineer who can get a job at Google, your take-home pay after housing will be dramatically higher in the US than in Canada (if you don't like the lifestyle sacrifices that requires in the Bay Area or NYC, you can do better in umpteen smaller cities). All the while you will have access to better health care, lower wait times, and easy immigration status (TN).

      we've been a branch plant economy since the 1960s. A lot of
      this has to do with Canadian temperament and mindset, which
      isn't particularly entrepreneurial due a dearth of
      leadership from its investor class.

No argument there. Those in Canada who really control the money are overwhelmingly complacent, more interested in maintaining what they have than taking real risks. Much of it isn't self-made, it's just inherited from early 20th century industrialists. Not that many modern self-made wealth stories other than a bunch of people speculating on real estate, literally collecting rent rather than adding productive capacity or consumer surplus.

<comment><USER13> Being a tech worker in the US isn't all that great once you're building a family and need to consider the education, housing, healthcare impacts of the US system. There is more to life than comp. In particular , having experienced both systems quite intensively, I really don't agree the healthcare is better in the US.

I certainly encourage young Canadian tech workers to move to the US for a while (as I did) to make some money and see what it's like.

However, many of us eventually moved back. One of the better deals is to work remotely for US tech while in Canada, to get some of the comp benefits while living in a much better overall country (in terms of many factors - happiness, quality of life, life expectancy, inclusiveness, etc). This will be subjective of course. But I don't think it's disingenuous or myopic to be happy that these tech giants are growing in Canada. It keeps people here. Being here makes a difference.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> For any Canadian citizens wanting to work in USA: [https://chanian.com/2010/08/01/tutorial-moving-from- canada-t...](https://chanian.com/2010/08/01/tutorial-moving-from-canada-to- america-as-a-software-developer/)

</comment><comment><USER16> As an American who's committed to staying in Canada until my kids leave the house, and who's experienced the Canadian hiring market for the last 10 years, I'm both excited and concerned.

Excited, because now that I've joined one of these SV companies recently expanding their presence Canada, my yearly TC is now an integer multiple of what I was making at a local small company.

But I'm also concerned, because the majority of Canadian companies absolutely cannot compete. At all. My fear is all the biggest talent will get sucked into US-based companies. Super hypocritical of me, I know.

Canada needs so many more Shopifys.

<comment><USER17> Google's expansion means that Google is succeeding, not the scene around them. Their hiring more people doesn't increase the number of tech-related companies at all. Maybe the number of banh mi shops will grow. It just means that Google likes the lower cost of running some operations up there.

The scene around might grow and might not. Wannabe Googlers might come on spec and work for a different employer if Google doesn't work out. Xooglers will be emerge eventually, but if they're not making googly money, it's hard to see them staying to work in tech.

</comment></comment><comment><USER18> Microsoft and Amazon used to park people that didn't get H1B in Vancouver. Wasn't that the same as what Google is doing now?

<comment><USER19> No Google has proper engineering in Toronto / Waterloo.

<comment><USER20> Not really Toronto (sales and business primarily) but there's engineering in Montreal also.

<comment><USER19> Chrome has really important teams in Waterloo. Sales is a small part of that office.

<comment><USER20> Toronto and Waterloo both have offices. I said Toronto is sales and business, not Waterloo.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER21> The cheap labour pool as a consequence of the weak Canadian dollar certainly helps, alongside having identical time zones and nearly identical culture to the United States. Lots of Canadian consultancies butter their bread with USD.

<comment><USER22> >> nearly identical culture to the United States.

Lol. Maybe a _similar_ culture to some parts of California or Washington, and that is a stretch, but Vancouver is very very different than "the United States". Live in both for a while and all the little difference (the guns, health care, government, police, civil-military relations, the environment, land use, education etc) add up to markedly different approaches to life.

<comment><USER23> Have you been to Alberta? Vancouver is not representative of canada.

<comment><USER24> It seems you're insinuating that Alberta is somehow more (U.S.) 'American' than the rest of Canada.

I have lived in Alberta for over ten years, and though culturally distinct from the rest of Canada (as is every other province I've spent time in) Alberta's brand of rugged individualist / conservatism is still very Canadian.

And though we may look very different to the urbanites of GVRD (Vancouver and surrounding) and the GTA (Toronto and surrounding), you'll find many more similarities between us and those living in rural Canada with resource-based economies, like the people living in B.C.'s forestry-dependent areas, the northern prairies or NorthWest Ontario. The difference for us is that we have very vocal, oil-industry-controlled politicians and a population that is immediately suspicious of any time an easterner tries to tell us what to do.

Sometimes the easiest way to see our distinctiveness is by contrast - immediately evident when crossing over to even the closest border states.

I love Montana and its people, but boy do you know you're not in Canada anymore - roadways lined with advertisements; cops everywhere you look; huge rich/poor divides; razor wire, visible drug problems and ghettos in even the smallest cities; and a love of all things military.

All that to say, there's far more to being Albertan than oil, guns and god, and those three things don't make us a 'murican.

<comment><USER22> Agreed. I lived in the us for five years, it was a shock. The big thing for me was the guns, the constant militarism. Albertans might own lots of guns but they don't take them to pizza hut. And cops everywhere. I was in seattle recently and counted 8 different TYPES of police car on a quick 4-block walk between buildings. Not car paint jobs, different types of police. ICE, fed, state, local, atf... America seems to have more police than not. Canada, all of canada, doesn't feel like that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER25> ...we've been having these kinds of headlines from local media outlets pretty much everywhere where FAANG have created/expanded presences. -- But it seems to me that these companies are extremely centralized and only decentralize to the extent that it is unavoidable (e.g. distributed data centers for reasons of latency) or that it captures special opportunities (e.g. Apple expanding in Munich right now, but doing only hardware and chip design work in what seems to me like a play to pick up talent from competitors like Infineon)

Also: I'd quite like to see what the distribution of carreer-levels is, when comparing Silicon Valley to non-Silicon Valley locations for these companies. I'd be willing to bet that non-Silicon Valley locations have predominantly more junior people, and that certain promotions are harder to get and will come with the necessity to move to the valley.

<comment><USER26> How is opening 5000 new jobs in Canada a sign that Google is "extremely centralized"? In regards to your Munich example, what exactly is the issue with that? If there's a large amount of talent in some area why wouldn't you want to try and compete for it? Anyway, I have a good feeling that office will grow soon, there's plenty of non-hardware and chip design talent in that area :) You do have to start somewhere though. I will also make an educated guess that Google isn't hiring just junior people, and even if they were, they would grow into more senior roles anyway.

<comment><USER25> 5000 new jobs is not what the article is saying, but _capacity to grow to_ 5000\. I don't know how many they have now, and creating capacity to do something is not the same as actually doing it. Also, to put the number in perspective: 5000 would be only 4.3% of their global workforce, and my guess would be that Canada must actually be one of their biggest non-U.S. presences. (London also has a strong one for Google).

I'm also not saying that there's anything wrong with these companies expanding their presences outside the valley. (I would very much welcome it), only that we're not seeing enough of it right now to contradict the notion that these companies are still very much centralized. Maybe real estate prices and competition for tech talent will eventually force them to properly decentralize. But I could also see a scenario where those companies could put their might into play to overcome that resistance-level and allow them to continue growing while remaining centralized. It's simply too early to tell which way this thing is playing out.

<comment><USER27> > we're not seeing enough of it right now to contradict the notion that these > companies are still very much centralized.

What are you basing this on, and what would be enough ?

4.3%, if indeed happens that way, would be a substantial portion. They already have significant presence in NYC, Seattle/Kirkland, London, Zurich, LA, Hyderabad, Dublin, Tokyo, Austin, etc. A few thousand here and a few thousand there add up quickly.

EDIT: Added a few more that I remembered.

<comment><USER25> The numbers in the article are country-level, and you're responding by saying things about cities. NYC, Seattle and LA are all in the U.S. They're centralized inside the U.S. at the city-level to Mountain View. They're centralized within the English-speaking world at the country-level to the U.S. They're centralized globally w.r.t. language communities to the English- speaking world.

<comment><USER19> You have no basis for your comment, no numbers, sources etc. Zurich, London, Tokyo all have very senior levels and many important teams. Canada is growing to those levels as well. Do your research before burying a hatchet.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER28> It seems to me they're doing it partially because it's cheaper in Canada ( compared to the US dollar ) as far as salaries, etc go.

Pretty soon, rent is going to be too high for someone making 100k Canadian ( if it isn't already )

<comment><USER29> The dollar is likely a factor, as you mention. But from their list of cities only Toronto has a crisis of home affordability. Montreal is still within sane levels and Waterloo is not too much worse.

<comment><USER30> From Toronto but live in Montreal.

Rents in Montreal are going up but still no where near Toronto level. Cost of living is lower too on many levels. Of course it depends on the area but generally it's reasonable.

You can live pretty comfortably on a 75k salary and lots of people in the tech sector make more than this, infosec paying even 6 figures in some places.

I recently turned down an offer from Google for a job in Sunnyvale because even though I might have been paid twice as much, I knew the cost of living was much higher and quality of life probably not as good.

<comment><USER31> You probably want to keep quiet about that.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER32> I'm curious about the salaries and potential for career growth for software engineers with 5,10,15 years of experience in Canada. Levels.fyi is handy for the US salaries but not so much for Canada.

Fwiw, I am a foreign grad student currently happy with the lifestyle in Canada. But I'm wondering whether I've made the right career move moving to Canada.

edit: include career growth

</comment><comment><USER33> I would imagine a lot of this is de-risking the issues surrounding the nativism in US politics. Canada is a good nearshore location. I presume visas for foreigners are considerably less problematic.

I'm in Sydney and we see Amazon do a lot of recruitment sessions here.

</comment><comment><USER34> The most interesting takeaway for me is that never talk about 'super evilness' of FANG etc when discussion is about salaries. Instead berate companies which have no worldwide ad money pouring in for not matching the otherwise evil companies.

</comment><comment><USER35> The best thing that could ever happen to Canada would get rid of that god awful TN-Visa. TN - Talent Nuke. Completely sucks us dry of people moving to the US.

<comment><USER36> Alternatively, if wages were competitive in Canada (even considering cost of living and health care) there would be no reason to move. Personally, I'd much rather be in Canada to be near my family but I'd be making 1/2 the wage and have less talent to learn and grow from.

<comment><USER37> Yes there still would be: weather. There's literally no place in Canada that doesn't have a generally unpleasant outdoor experience for at least half the year. I say that as a proud Canadian. It's honestly the main thing holding my family from moving back. My wife is from Vancouver and hates snow. I'm from Calgary and can't take rain (I did 3 winters straight in Vancouver promising myself to never do another until I finally got out). We've been looking for somewhere in Canada and we can't find a solution.

It may sound small but it has a major impact on our happiness, energy levels, and overall well-being.

<comment><USER38> Toronto has none of Vancouver's rain and almost none of Calgary's snow. I wear running shoes for all save maybe 3 or 4 weeks of winter. -15 is considered a deep freeze and happens about 3 times per winter. What are you waiting for?

<comment><USER37> My wife is a UofT grad, so spent 4 years in Toronto. That's where her snow feelings come from – she still tells stories of marching to class in -20C and snow. It may not be Calgary, but it's not California either. Maybe we're wimps, but such is the situation we find ourselves in!

Maybe we'll be back some day. Toronto is the most likely.

On topic for the parent – we're both Googlers but right now Google has no tech employees in Toronto proper (it's all sales and marketing). Waterloo is the only product/eng office and that's a tough commute. I'm not sure if that is changing with this announcement.

<comment><USER39> That isn't true. Downtown Toronto has multiple Google engineers. I know one in brain and one in cloud. One has been in TO for ~2.5 years, the other for 1 year. As far as I know the only way to get into the office is by special permission. One of them only got their role because they said they were quitting due to the waterloo commute.

Fwiw I'm a Canadian that just signed a Google offer to work out of downtown SF because I hate the winter too. I think people care more or less about the weather based on their hobbies / interests.

<comment><USER14> The number of engineers at Google Toronto is so small that they're the exception that proves the rule, though. For all intents and purposes beyond some very special cases (and the Hinton stuff) you can treat the site as having no engineering.

<comment><USER40> > The number of engineers at Google Toronto is so small that they're the > exception that proves the rule, though.

Exceptions don't prove the rule.

<comment><USER41> The point of this idiom is that they end up not being exceptions at all.

<comment><USER42> That is not what I understand it to mean -- rather, the opposite. That is, finding an engineer at the Toronto office is so improbable that it is _remarkable_ , hence you are reminded that it is normally an engineer free zone.

There are some idioms that do mean it is unexceptional. You might be familiar with the Pratchettism "Million-to-one chances happen nine times out of ten."

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER43> Allowing to park people and outsourcing is not a tech boom. Different mindset, different understanding, different risks, limited upside at the end. A country on salary.

</comment><comment><USER44> Expand expand expand, in small incremental replacements that actually offer no net gain over time...

</comment><comment><USER45> It is always cheap labor. Same with Taiwan. Doesn't say much about the country itself.

<comment><USER46> Cheap? These Canadian cities? The cost of living is insane and tech hiring competition is already intense. It's not going to be cheap to hire anyone there.

<comment><USER47> Software engineer salaries are significantly lower than in the US.

> The median Canadian "Software Engineer" salary is CA$72,000. The median US > salary is US$91,000.... The cost of living in Vancouver is about 4.8% higher > than Austin. While the median Software Engineer salary in Austin is 40% > higher than Vancouver when accounting for the exchange rate.

[https://medium.com/@sprice/more-canadian-software- engineers-...](https://medium.com/@sprice/more-canadian-software-engineers- should-work-remotely-c69f52c746d4)

<comment><USER48> As an aside, I passionately hate that graph. It implies that Canadian tech salaries are abnormally low. I wish it was either showing just the US, or included more countries than just US and Canada. Had they included London, Sydney, Berlin, Amsterdam, etc. in the graph, it would have showed that Canadian salaries are in line with and towards the higher end of world salaries except US, and that US salaries are a huge outlier in the world stage.

<comment><USER49> This needs to be more visible.

I'm a Canadian working for a US FAANMG company, and I've been based out of both their Canadian and European offices.

I make way more in Vancouver than my peers in ANY European office (which include Zurich, London, Berlin)

And those places are more expensive than Vancouver (not counting buying real estate which is not relevant to me as a renter)

But of course I'm keenly aware that I'd make 30% more in Seattle, and 50% more in Silicon Valley.

Does it bother me? Not really. I've been to those places and I would take the lifestyle quality of both Vancouver and Canada over any part of the US. Plus these days, I don't see a way of living in the US, and not feeling complicit in all the evils of the country. Not without radical participation in trying to destroy the system from within.

And despite what people say about the similarity in work culture, it's more reasonable in Canada from sick leave to vacation, to day-to-day expectations of work-life balance.

<comment><USER50> Is your employer spending the same in all these places? If not it should bother you.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER51> Part of the reason for this is that the Trump administration has made it _very_ hard for Canadians working for tech companies to visit the US on business. I have friends who used to frequently and freely travel between the two countries for meetings, and now they all have corporate policies forbidding it.

As is always the case with protectionist policies, the country imposing them experiences a net loss.

<comment><USER48> This is the first time I am hearing about this. Could you please expand on what the policy change is?</comment></comment>


Vancouver bans whales and dolphins at aquarium - <AUTHOR> http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39943267 <comment><USER3> So frustrating.

The Vancouver acquarium was one of the top cetacean health, care, and research institutes in the world. It was one of the models of how good a captive and public educational environment can be. Thanks to campaigns like this one, they had to close down and transfer their rescue orcas to the only organizations that could take them... Which turned out to be SeaWorld, where they died shortly after. Of course, SeaWorld is notorious for terrible conditions for the animals.

It drives me nuts that kids growing up in my hometown now don't understand these magnificent creatures, don't feel any special connection to them. For many in my generation, it feels like a betrayal on the part of our local environmentalist movement. They killed our orcas and disconnected our children from one of the most amazing parts of their environment. They destroyed the model that powered legislative attempts to protect cetaceans around the world.

We had a similar story with the beavers in Stanley park - our environmenal lobby campaigned to have the city stop dredging "Beaver lake", because it disturbed the beavers. They stopped dredging, the lake filled with silt and most of the beavers (and other wildlife) died. Now they're debating starting dredging again, to save the one surviving beaver.

For people like me that care about our environment and the animals we share it with, it's rage inducing. The naturalist fallacy at work. :/

<comment><USER4> "They killed our orcas" \- really? 2 Belugas just died in captivity at that aquarium -it wasn't environmentalists who killed them, it was the aquarium. I have been to that aquarium and it was just depressing. Watching the Orca swim upside down around and around in circles was the saddest thing I've ever seen. Making intelligent creatures perform tricks for profit is hardly a noble enterprise. Have you seen Blackfish? [http://www.blackfishmovie.com/](http://www.blackfishmovie.com/) Watch it and then come back and tell us that Tilikum had any kind of good life. These animals belong in the wild. They don't need to be "rescued". The idea that gawking at magnificent animals in captivity is somehow required to instill respect for them is ridiculous. The best way to respect all animals is to leave them alone.

<comment><USER5> Counterpoint: The animals they are rescuing would have died in the wild.

I personally think that although it'll make children watching the local news cry, we should help animals and immediately return them to the wild. If the only way to help them means taking them into captivity, we should not help.

<comment><USER6> > we should help animals and immediately return them to the wild. If the only > way to help them means taking them into captivity, we should not help.

It depends on the animal of course, and if they're social animals or prefer solitude. There are many birds, injured beyond rehabilitation, that seem to do fine in captivity (so long as it's a good centre with lots of space -- most places don't though which is sad. The Cincinnati Zoo is an example of a good centre for rehabilitation).

When it comes to dolphins and whales, I totally agree though. They're simply too big and they evolved to travel massive distances. If they can be treated and nursed for a few weeks and immediately released, I think that's the best thing.

Why should aquatic specialists decide if they'd survive in the wild? If they are healthy enough to at least be able to find others of their kind, is it not better to die free than live long in a cage?

<comment><USER7> >is it not better to die free than live long in a cage?

From an instinctive and evolutionary standpoint, definitely the latter.

<comment><USER8> Yeah, as long as you're talking about permanently domesticating an animal so they'll be 'cage dolphins' or whatever. Otherwise that's absolutely not true.

<comment><USER7> You misunderstood. The point is, an animal will always attempt to keep living regardless of how painful or hopeless the situation. It's a basic instinct.

<comment><USER9> Well that's what we've perfected in animal farming isn't it. Cows, pigs, chicken injected with vaccines, given food and hormones that makes them live long enough to produce offspring and maximum human consumable resources. Their emotional and psychological needs are the least of our concerns.

I am with "letting wild animals be wild". If an animal can be patched up and let back into the wild after a couple of week, great. I hate aquariums and zoos for this reason. Its the human equivalent of [https://popularresistance.org/deep-racism-the-forgotten- hist...](https://popularresistance.org/deep-racism-the-forgotten-history-of- human-zoos/)

I would rather prefer reserves. e.g Nairobi national park, serengeti, mara. Really large spaces where animals can remain wild but conservation programs can still take place.

Vancouver aquarium in its Vancouver's ridiculously priced real estate doesn't have enough space to host big intelligent animals.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> My fear is that these laws will ultimately prove to be worse for conservation efforts. The same applies to zoos.

The vast majority of people in the developed nations, will never actually see these animals in their native habitat. I would say the majority of the HN readers have never seen a lion, tiger, rhinoceros, elephant, orca, or shark outside of a zoo, aquarium, or sanctuary.

The effect of these laws is that more and more people will not have a personal connection to these animals. Therefore, when it comes to cheaper goods versus animal extinction, people may say that they feel bad about it, but their behavior and voting patterns are unlikely to change to prevent the extinction.

For example, if I hear that the giraffe will go extinct, I think back to the excitement of when I first saw a giraffe, and feel sad that my kids may never get to experience that and am likely to be more motivated to prevent it. If, however it is some animal that I have only seen in a video, well, I'll make sure to download it so I can show it to my kids someday.

Out of sight, out of mind really is a true statement about human attention and motivation.

<comment><USER11> There's a more direct impact, too: The Vancouver Aquarium houses animals which have been rescued and nursed back to health after various injuries. This ban will result in many of those animals being left to die instead.

<comment><USER12> >This ban will result in many of those animals being left to die instead

I think that is hyperbole. They are only banning the whales, not all the other animals that are helped by the aquarium. I was at the aquarium this last summer. There's much more to it than the beluga whales. Sure some people will choose not to go once the whales are gone, but there's still tons of other things to see.

<comment><USER13> It elides the argument, but it's not hyperbole. Agitating groups like peta want to end animal captivity, completely. They believe humane captivity is a moral contradiction, extending to domestic cats and dogs.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment> tuna-piano What's worse, and why:

-Locking a dolphin up in "jail" or killing a cow/pig?

-Locking the few dolphins up in "jails" or the billions of cows/pigs killed each year?

I think the ethical inconsistencies with regards to animal treatment are huge, but also understandable. I don't know the answers, but the questions do bother me.

<comment><USER14> Cows are treated pretty fairly until the end. They are usually grass feed and graze until they fatten them up for slaughter. They have miles and miles of fields to roam. You can find pigs that are treated fairly or are "free range". Both of these animals have been domesticated and lives with humans for a couple thousand years.

Both of these animals are slaughtered young so they aren't locked up for years and years.

Putting an dolphin in a small pond and put to work all day doing tricks is horrible. Whales and dolphins belong in the open ocean where they can swim for miles and miles. They are not domesticated animals.

My view is that if you have to put the animal in a cage to keep it, you shouldn't have them. The exception would be a fish tank with nothing exotic.

<comment><USER15> Most animals that are raised for meat are treated horribly. there is no way around that. I am not for dolphins being held captive but they have it much better than most cows, pigs or chickens.

<comment><USER14> I agree about chickens. My state is the chicken capital of the world. Those coops are so nasty you can start to smell them a mile away.

The only way it will change is everyone buys organic or true free range. The costs are too expensive for me to buy all the time. I think Americans should rethink eating meat at most meals. I've not been able to do it regularly.

<comment><USER16> > The only way it will change is everyone buys organic or true free range. The > costs are too expensive for me to buy all the time

Both of those terms are pretty meaningless, and their ineffectual enforcement makes them even less so. The solution isn't to humane-wash, it's to stop eating things that come out of chickens' anuses.

<comment><USER17> The terms might be meaningless, but that still shouldn't stop you from sourcing your meat/poultry locally from a farmer where you can witness the living conditions of the animals yourself before buying.

That way you are not only doing something healthy for yourself and the animals, it's also supporting the local economy in a meaningful way.

<comment><USER16> > That way you are not only doing something healthy for yourself and the > animals, it's also supporting the local economy in a meaningful way.

There is nothing healthy about consuming animals. Not for humans, not for animals, not for this planet, not for anyone. And a similar "supporting the economy" justification was used in defense of slavery, which you're still supporting in another form.

<comment><USER17> >And a similar "supporting the economy" justification was used in defense of slavery, which you're still supporting in another form.

Seriously... I advocate people being more aware of where they get their food and cutting down on their meat intake and your first reflex is to compare it to advocating slavery? Sorry but behavior like that is exactly the reason why barely anybody likes vegans or takes them seriously.

Change doesn't happen in massive paradigm shifts, it happens slowly. You won't convince 7 billion people to stop consuming animal products from one day to another. So let's be a little bit realistic and start with small steps which people are actually willing to take, wouldn't that be an actual start?

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER18> This is also coming in France as told here: [http://www.lemonde.fr/biodiversite/article/2017/05/06/la- cap...](http://www.lemonde.fr/biodiversite/article/2017/05/06/la-captivite- des-dauphins-et-des-orques-sera-interdite-a-terme-en- france_5123541_1652692.html) (in French)

From now on, the reproduction of cetaceans is prohibited, as the introduction of new animals. Therefore, dolphins and whales in captivity will no longer exist and suffer. This was triggered following an incident at MarineLand, one of the biggest parks, where a mudslide killed many animals in 2015.

<comment><USER19> That's are rather bizarre reason to ban captive animals. Why ban them over a natural disaster rather than whether they can be adequately kept in captivity?

</comment></comment><comment><USER20> Rescuers find you in the woods with a broken leg dying and starving. You can choose:

1) To be left to die of starvation.

2) To be rescued and spend the rest of your life fed but kept in a 6x6 ft cage.

Pick one.

<comment><USER7> 2b) By choosing to be rescued and studied you are increasing the scientific knowledge, general awareness and overall compassion for your species.

Thus, you would be contributing to your species' long term survival.

Site note: I don't think a 6x6 human cage is analogous. Maybe a medium-sized apartment in which you can socialize with other humans is a fairer comparison? It would be a poor existence indeed. But worse than death?

<comment><USER21> Quick, someone explain this to the whales!

Give me a break.

<comment><USER7> Care to present an actual argument?

<comment><USER21> In what universe can you possibly explain to an anxious, confined whale that their non-ideal living conditions (read: conditions which kill them) is at least beneficial to their species?

How does this make the practice any less cruel?

Reading through the comments on this thread I'm actually flabbergasted.

<comment><USER7> Obviously you can't explain it to a whale. What are you even talking about? This is a message board for human beings. The topic was _what choice the animal might make if it had the reasoning skills of a human being (and all the facts)_.

>How does this make the practice any less cruel?

It doesn't. It's arguing that there might be at least _some_ long term potential benefit to the practice for the species and therefore morally defensible (if the alternative is letting the animal die slowly and painfully).

I don't pretend to know all the answers. But lets at least be clear on what the question is.

<comment><USER21> Right and my assertion is that because the whales are incapable of understanding their "sacrifice" for their species they are simply kept in a state of anxiety, trapped in a too small enclosure for the remainder of their days and THAT trumps any argument built on vagueries about the potential conservation benefits. I'd much rather spend all the money used in housing these whales on field studies and establishing conservation zones in the actual environment.

<comment><USER7> There's nothing whatsoever vague about the benefits it provides researchers (and therefore the species). To suggest otherwise is anti-science akin to climate denial.

You're also misunderstanding the choices available:

1) The alternative for the whale in this scenario is __death __. Are you _sure_ the whale would choose that over living in an aquarium? How sure?

Remember - The overwhelming majority of human beings don't even make that choice (see: suicide rates of long-term prisoners).

2) > I'd much rather spend all the money used in housing these whales on field studies and establishing conservation zones in the actual environment.

What money? You mean the money generated from the aquarium? Oh wait. Ummm... I have some very bad news about your proposed scheme.

It really doesn't sound like you've thought this through. I admire the compassion of people like you. I really do. But, you seem to be living in some alternate universe from the rest of us. You might be better served to think with your heart _and_ your brain.

<comment><USER21> Tone down the condescension.

Obviously zoos and aquariums can do great work but there are animals in this world that do not live in captivity very well and if they were capable of properly weighing the options I'm sure many would choose death. I know many humans (myself inclused) who would make the same choice. If we can show certain species of whale can handle captivity well then by all means save them, house them, whatever but I doubt these particular whales are being let go lightly and sitting around saying 'think of the missed scientific opportunity' ignores the well-being of the whale. And maybe if it were possible to communicate to the whale the benefit of its sacrifice it might be ok but we can't and to ignore the anxiety of the whale is cruel.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER22> There used to be a place for these animals in aquariums. When they were they for research purposes, rehabilitation, and education, like it or not - <USER2> public education benefit was worth it for humans. Most belugas and dolphins live much longer lives, with much less stress, than they would in the wild.

I say used to be, because the current climate in aquariums is just "Make it jump for us." and education is a far off second thought.

Our ability to study animals in the wild, with high tech GPS tracking, more accessible travel options, better sensor data, etc, is much greater than it was 30-40 years ago when these animals were being put in zoos and aquariums. We don't need them in there anymore from a scientific point of view. The argument that people form connections with them? I don't know.

</comment><comment><USER23> How about we work on creating a world where we don't need to rescue these creatures in the first place.

<comment><USER24> What? The Garden of Eden? Nature is cruel enough without our intervention.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> As someone who grew up visiting the Vancouver aquarium, I struggle a bit with this decision. Vancouver'saquarium has always tried to brand itself as research focused, and I have concerns about the loss to research if we stop allowing the aquarium to work with rescues. Personally, I have no problem with keeping rescues that are unreleaseable and injured by humans.

A friend who worked there shared the following, which is worth a read if you're n interested in the topic:. [http://vanmag.com/city/how-working-at-the- vancouver-aquarium...](http://vanmag.com/city/how-working-at-the-vancouver- aquarium-changed-my-view-on-cetaceans-in-captivity/)

<comment><USER26> [http://www.vancouveraquariumuncovered.com/](http://www.vancouveraquariumuncovered.com/) "Branding"

</comment></comment><comment><USER27> The way the headline is phrased, it could also be read as "Vancouver will not allow whales and dolphins admission to the aquarium" which makes me giggle. Imagining a dolphin with a DSLR camera around its neck and some oversized flip flops. Reminds me of a book I grew up reading. "The Three Hawaiian Pigs and the Magic Shark" \- not exactly mainstream, but I really liked it.

</comment><comment><USER28> It seems that somebody poisoned the beluga whales for pushing some agenda and the aquarium stopped the recovering programme either in fear or as response. I understand the situation. This is happening at global scale and is totally upsetting.

</comment><comment><USER29> We cage and kill other humans every day, are any of you surprised we do the same to animals?

<comment><USER30> When a grown up man picks a fight with another grown up man, it is ok. But if a grown up man picks a fight with a child, this is just sick.

That is why some people are appalled by what is happening with humans vs other animals.

</comment></comment><comment><USER31> Good. Hope others see the problem too. Especially the US...

</comment><comment><USER32> All discussions of killer whales (which inevitably include Blackfish now) remind me of that Phoenix Wright case where he defends a killer whale accused of murder (Spoiler alert: the real killer was a person!).

</comment><comment><USER33> I believe the Aquarium here was against it, saying they've only ever taken rescues who couldn't survive in the wild anymore. Those rescues would now be put down.

</comment><comment><USER34> why not chimpanzees?

<comment><USER35> You have to ask the question why zoos at all, I know most have been promoting their role in conservation but I'm quite sceptical about that.

<comment><USER28> Why zoos?

Because furtivism, habitat loss, contamination, sixth extinction, education and conservation.

Because some species only survive in zoos today.

Because only 9 of each 10 wild lions in Africa had dissapeared in one human generation lapse time, etc, etc...

<comment><USER36> At first the zoo was menagerie only for the pleasure not about conservation. They evolved to conservation.

Now they see that they can not properly take care of animals, even if they try to do their best they still do not know how to do it right. New sickness, etc.

The only way to save animals is by decree a land where human do not have any rights to go their.

<comment><USER28> This is just plain old Bullshit. People in zoos are professionals and of course they know how to care for the animals.

The only way to save animals... [set them free, blah, blah, blah]

Then why the white rhinos are still endangered? Will survive the californian porpoise four years more? I, and many other people, seriously doubt it.

<comment><USER37> Of course they're professionals, but modern Zoos are there for entertainment first. The conservation part is not priority anymore. If we need them for conservation then let's focus on that, no need to have thousands of people visiting.

<comment><USER38> Many of the conservation efforts contributed by zoos would disappear without the funds generated by the thousands of people visiting.

</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER39> Are they banned as visitors or as attractions?

</comment><comment><USER40> WHY!!!??! Their money is as good as anyones!

</comment><comment><USER41> we should ban any form of animal captivity

<comment><USER42> You would likely be well served by watching Penn and Teller's PETA episode. And perhaps some wildlife documentaries - there's nothing quite like getting eaten alive.

Most captive animals exist because we tend to them. Are you suggesting that we let them die of starvation or simply eliminate them (as PETA does with many of their 'rescued' animals)?

<comment><USER16> > Are you suggesting that we let them die of starvation or simply eliminate > them

A reasonable person might suggest we not purposefully birth 150 billion+ animals every year just so they can be killed. The "let them starve" argument is a strawman, since the whole world would not eschew animal products overnight, but rather as a gradual progress.

<comment><USER42> Interesting. Wouldn't it be much more appropriate to argue a false dilemma in this situation?

You suggested gradual elimination, which is an elimination process. I would argue that neither fallacy apply.

I wonder what proportion of animals would chose non-existence over existence if they could understand such concepts. That's quite the decision to make for them.

<comment><USER16> > I wonder what proportion of animals would chose non-existence over existence > if they could understand such concepts.

May I suggest you look at some footage from slaughterhouses to make that determination for yourself? Or, if you're particularly stoic, I dare you to watch Earthlings.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Tardigrades Were Already on the Moon - <AUTHOR> https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/life-unbounded/tardigrades-were-already-on-the-moon/ <comment><USER2> Maybe. It's not impossible. Or something like tardigrades, or microbes.

The definite tone of the title is pretty much clickbait

</comment><comment><USER3> Fermi Paradox Theory: life in the universe is either rare(outside of the tardigrades flying around) or intelligent life is too short lived to have any overlap. If we've only had the technology to identify life elsewhere for a few hundred years against the last 14 billion years, what are the odds another civilization exists at the exact same time in a place we could find them? Even if humans exist for 100k years that's still such a tiny sliver of time in the cosmos. It's no wonder we're not finding anyone. It's either that or the Dark Forest doing its thing.

<comment><USER4> How is this relevant?</comment></comment>


RMS Quits GNU Project - <AUTHOR> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#27_September_2019_(GNU_Project) <comment><USER2> Huge thread already here: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21103133](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21103133)

Most importantly, the top comment observes that it's somewhat likely this is fake.

</comment><comment><USER3> This is sad, but it was also bound to happen eventually. I went to one of his talks a few years ago, and what had been billed as a one hour talk dragged on for almost 2 1/2 hours. After the first hour, people were getting up and leaving. Whenever anyone did, he would call them out from the stage. It was very awkward.

While I believe strongly in Free Software, I think the movement would really benefit from a new more charismatic leader, someone from a younger generation. I hate to say that because RMS has given and sacrificed so much, but times have changed.

</comment><comment><USER4> I wonder if he'd take donations for a personal break rather than for GNU?

Judging by his website, he gets wrapped up in the whole world's biz. A stretch of RMS-time is probably long overdue.

</comment><comment><USER5> The same message where he resigns as head of the GNU project is posted both on the 27th and the 28th of September on this page. Strange.

</comment><comment><USER6> Dupe: [https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21103133](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21103133)

<comment><USER7> That post is a dupe of this one; this one was posted first.

<comment><USER8> But many more comments on the other one.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER9> The Twitter bullies will be so happy and think it was their voice that made the difference. In truth, they are nothing without the antifreedom Twitter mods promoting their hate.

</comment><comment><USER10> Wow, this site is the best Twitter interface I've ever seen. Loads fast, no stupid replies, written with free software.

</comment><comment><USER11> It is impossible to express how sad these events are... we had a new Socrates and we gave him the hemlock again, for reasons even more ridiculous than two thousand years ago.

<comment><USER12> He had a full career and he's still alive. Quit being ridiculous.

<comment><USER13> Metaphors are quite useful tools.

<comment><USER14> Are you being sarcastic, or do you see the parent post as an attack on the concept of metaphor?

<comment><USER13> >>Are you being sarcastic, or do you see the parent post as an attack on the concept of metaphor?

Given that the parent post has been substatially edited without comment after a reply was posted, it's a moot point to comment on the response sans original context.</comment></comment></comment></comment></comment>


Ask HN: How do you diversify your income? - <AUTHOR> As I get older, I'm trying to focus less on absolute financial independence than a sort of income redundancy, where I have enough sources of revenue to sustain my barest expenses in case something goes wrong.
My dream: four or five streams, requiring different levels of investment and labor, but generally clocking in under 40 hours and, to the point where I could lose one or face a serious cutback in two, and never be in jeopardy.
I know this overlaps with the passive income obsession, so I'm excited to hear HN's thoughts, but I'm concerned less with overall effort than reducing the risk tied to my income coming solely from my job.
I'm super interested to hear if any HN'ers have tried to diversify their income outside of tech, maybe through some small-ball physical investments like ATMs or vending machines?
background: late 20s, FE dev, small amount of savings, no debt <comment><USER2> My fantasy set up: remote FT developer, with a small float tank business in my basement, and a dog walking business with a few clients. A few hundred dollars a day from various sources, with a nice walk in the afternoon, and a chance to meet new people through the float tank business. If you lose your dev job, the main source of income, you at least have enough back up to get you through it. I have no idea if this is actually feasible or not, but it's what I'll be attempting to pull off over the next few years.

Think about what you enjoy doing and if there's some way to get paid for that. Teaching, writing, speaking, land lording, house flipping, coaching. Design, build, and manage (or some subset of that) vacation properties, and you can use them for yourself when not rented.

You could also use some labour to reduce costs rather than generate income. Grow your own food, fix your own car, ERE style.

</comment><comment><USER3> Considering you mentioned "focus less on absolute financial independence" and "small amount of savings", I guess that you want to generate multiple streams of income through your "labor" instead of "capital".

There are only two ways to generate, increase, create multiple stream of income through "labor": increase number of hours of "labor" spent working and/or increase the hourly rate you charge for your "labor". Two problems with "labor" based income generation approach: there is upper limit on the "labor" hours you can contribute and "capital" providers typically control how much they will pay you for each hour of your "labor".

When you generate income through "capital", you have none of these limitations. Unlike days of our parents and grandparents when "labor" was well-respected, now a "capital" based income generation approach is considered much superior.

You should be thinking about how you can move from "labor" based to "capital" based income generation approach. My wife likes to say it like this: "I want my Green workers (color of dollar bills not newbies) to work hard for me instead of other way around." Focus on maximizing conversion of your "labor" into "capital", accumulate/save the earned "capital" and then use it to generate income.

</comment><comment><USER4> I'm working on this 'Portfolio' approach at the moment. Slowly, because I'm choosing to keep my main income fairly high which means it warrants more of my time.

Current income sources:

\- Primary business, working as a business coach/consultant. Affords us a fairly decent level of life, but I cap my income (well, time) to focus on other streams because consulting income is only ever as good as next month

\- Investment properties - 1 tenanted at present, with some plans to do the same with our current house. This is in Australia - both would be negatively geared, meaning they 'lose income money' every year (costs>revenue) but that's made up in capital growth. I originally thought property would be my primary wealth vehicle, but then got into business

\- I have one live profit share arrangement with another business I helped build, where I get x% of revenue for a period of time. Nothing awesome, but a valuable experience and some 'free' income each month

\- With my newest consulting brand, I plan to build on online membership knowledge base. Working on the structure and product/market fit right now.

\- There's another company I'm actively working on, with the same membership model in place.

Both of the final two are 'proofs of concept' for me - learning by doing. I believe my current business skill set lends itself to creating the brand and product for this business model, so I want to add experience with the online platforms and channels to round it out. If I can get that combination humming, there's nothing stopping me partnering up with subject matter experts to create a few similar business each year. Each that work might only be mid-6 figure pa businesses and I'd have a minority stake, but you don't need too many like that in your portfolio to have the financial independence you're describing.

</comment><comment><USER5> Not to say it can't be done, but it's probably better to focus on becoming more of an expert and learning new things to keep a job than an idea that's good at selling books, but really hard to achieve. I've lost a lot of money trying to chase side businesses. It's really hard to half ass something and make it successful. And if you do happen to find something like that why not put few more resources into it and make it really successful. The best investment I've had by far was socking away money into a 401k.

The problem is most businesses pay labor at minimum wage or slightly more plus own profit which a lot usually gets eaten by marketing, overhead etc.

<comment><AUTHOR> Thank you for your comment - I really appreciate that you engaged thoughtfully with my question.

I understand I could make a massive amount (relatively) of money specializing, and to a certain extent I am, but I truly hate the market's insistence I be a one-trick pony. I'm willing to accept a lower standard of living to avoid this. I want to focus on other things in my life than the problems my boss tells me are important.

EDIT: I'm a big fan of ERE, if that tells you anything.

<comment><USER5> You could become a consultant/contractor. Not telling you not to explore other opportunities and or businesses. Although, I would avoid most canned business opportunities. I would focus on one at a time until its been exploited to its potential.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER6> I buy ticker VOO, maxing out tax advantaged accounts first and then just keeping buying more.

[http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/02/22/getting-rich- from-...](http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/02/22/getting-rich-from-zero-to- hero-in-one-blog-post/)

</comment><comment><USER7> Something that I was listening to today along the same lines.

[http://www.madfientist.com/side-hustle-nation- interview/](http://www.madfientist.com/side-hustle-nation-interview/)

From the linked site:

Today on the Financial Independence Podcast, Nick Loper from Side Hustle Nation joins me to talk about the importance of investing in yourself, why you should diversify your income streams, and how creating your own side hustles can help make your journey to financial independence shorter and more enjoyable!

</comment><comment><USER8> Build some websites and sell them on [https://flippa.com](https://flippa.com).

Or buy one and improve it and collect adsense money.

<comment><USER9> does this work - always seems a minefield

</comment></comment><comment><USER10> I buy and sell HN Karma as an investment. So far im looking at about 40% ROI

<comment><USER11> Could you elaborate on this? I'm really curious ...</comment></comment>


Few successful entrepreneurs blog - <AUTHOR> https://twitter.com/rabois/status/397075060499812352 <comment><USER2> I'm a CEO of a co that's doing well.

This comment resonated with me.

Started blogging a few yrs ago, then dropped it.

1) ain't nobody have time for that.

2) too fraught in general. Supposed to be face of company so can't really say anything interesting in a blog.

3) and that Dalton kid posting the millionth "MBA and startups" article: who gives a fuck, what's the use, hire good people that fit... Don't engage in navel gazing analysis.

<comment><USER3> ain't nobody _got_ time for that

</comment></comment><comment><USER4> Few people blog, full stop. Is the proportion smaller among successful entrepreneurs?

There are a few companies and people that stand out immediately: 37signals, Joel Spolsky, Jeff Attwood, Priceonomics and probably a bunch more that I just don't pay attention to.

The last three really come to mind because blogging is pretty important to their companies. A large reason that StackOverflow had a strong audience from day one is that both Spolsky and Attwood had good followings on their blogs.

<comment><USER5> Not sure if this is an example or counterexamle. Both stopped or slowed on the blogging as Stackoverflow got big/mature.

</comment></comment><comment><USER6> Keith's comment surprised me. I found at least one counterexample among companies we've funded: Jason Freedman of 42Floors. But there are certainly not many.

<comment><USER7> If the challenge is to "think of successful entrepreneurs or CEOs who blog", I can think of a bunch off the top of my head:

Leo W. at Buffer - [http://blog.bufferapp.com/author/leo](http://blog.bufferapp.com/author/leo)

Ryan Carson at Treehouse - [http://ryancarson.com/](http://ryancarson.com/)

Jason Fried & DHH - [http://37signals.com/svn](http://37signals.com/svn)

Matt Mullenweg - [http://ma.tt/](http://ma.tt/)

Patio11 - [http://www.kalzumeus.com/](http://www.kalzumeus.com/)

<comment><USER8> Sridhar Vembu of Zoho - [http://blogs.zoho.com/author/sridhar](http://blogs.zoho.com/author/sridhar)

Craig Newmark - [http://craigconnects.org/blog](http://craigconnects.org/blog)

Mark Cuban - [http://blogmaverick.com](http://blogmaverick.com)

Tim O'Reilly - [http://radar.oreilly.com/tim](http://radar.oreilly.com/tim)

Yeah, I'm pretty sure evidence to the contrary is stronger. A little googling tells me C-levels and founders of forbes 100 are often proflic bloggers. Novell, Cisco, Oracle, a _lot_ of founders of big companies in India, and many here in the non-tech sector blog as well.

Insofar as commenting on HN and other similar sites is quite similar to blogging, there's a lot of others here too.

<comment><USER9> Craig and Mark are owners of companies or sports franchises (or own large amounts of equity in them), but are not CEOs. I'm not aware of the CEO of Craigslist, Jim Buckmaster, blogging. Nor am I aware of 2929 Entertainment's CEO, Todd Wagner (co-owned by Mark), blogging.

Also on some of the other folks listed in sibling comments, like Richard Branson, I'd be very surprised if he were the one posting on the Virgin "blog" under his name. Just as executives and politicians have speechwriters, they also have exec comm and marketing staff to write blog posts.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER10> Coding Horror?

The whole exchange seems to be @rabois saying "no, that's not a startup. No, that's not what I meant by CEO. No, he doesn't count."

What's his point in making this statement, except to attract attention?

<comment><USER11> Some people really like writing, or blogging, so they do it anyway, whether is useful or not.

I think the point Keith is making that successful people don't have time to blog, or the blog really doesn't help that much. They prioritize their time to do things that actually matter for their business, rather than being on top of HN or being tweeted 1000 times.

It's not the whole truth. When you have actually "made it", had some successes, you don't need the promotion or visibility that much, but when you're just starting out, basically anything might help.

<comment><USER12> Being tweeted 1000 times actually matters for a business if they have their own marketing machine ready to squire, convert and activated visitors.

<comment><USER12> Did I really write ready to squire? Correction: ready to acquire, convert and activate visitors.

</comment></comment></comment></comment><comment><USER13> Those who don't engage at the top of the funnel won't be able to afford advertising to the bottom of the funnel.

I Can't think of a single founder who blogged high quality original content consistently for more than two years that didn't turn his audience and readership into a successful company.

There is a massive misconception about blogging and content marketing in general that gets ignored by people. Creating content that can't be found anywhere else, content that represents the true voice of the CEO or founder and their vision is top of the funnel marketing that makes advertising and regular marketing MUCH MUCH More effective.

Content is the long game, and builds on itself one reader at a time. Eventually it breaks through and than every piece of content you produce gets massive exposure. Exposure at a much more affordable price than any other strategy that exists in the universe today.

Tomorrows leading companies will be the ones that realize they must become the media company for their niche. They must be the go to place for the best information in their industry.

Startup CEO's that don't blog are missing out on the big picture and should really learn to prioritize the value they can create.

Just look at Moz.com and Hubspot. Two great companies poised for massive growth that built their audience by blogging, one reader at a time.

<comment><USER14> > I Can't think of a single founder who blogged high quality original content > consistently for more than two years that didn't turn his audience and > readership into a successful company.

This is statistical nonsense. You are unlikely to be able to think of those founders who don't have successful companies, whether they blogged or not.

In general, we are more aware of founders who blog precisely because they do that. Making a list of blogging founders is pointless unless you have a fair way of listing the non-bloggers.

<comment><USER13> My claim is no more statistical nonsense than the original tweet that claimed successful ceos don't blog.

My point is simply that blogging is a proven, repeatable strategy for building an audience. An audience that trusts you and is happy to give you their money.

Whereas not-blogging is at best a shaky correlation to successful ceos and their success is just as likely to be despite their not blogging than because they save two hours a week not blogging.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER15> Few _people_ blog. The question is thus, "are bloggers represented proportionally among startup CEOs"?

</comment><comment> yo-mf And no successful VC's blog...oh wait.

Obviously most "people" do not blog regularly. Whether it is CEO's of startups or chefs at top tier restaurants or whatever else you can think of. Does real questions is whether anyone have time for blogging? And the answer for the most part is no.

Yet a few people persist. People laughed at Fred Wilson when he started blogging. VC's mocked him. A decade later, every major VC started blogging and are falling over each other to start their own online entrepreneur magazine.

How is this to turn the question on Keith's head: founder CEO's that blog will in fact be a bigger deal and provide better "cost/benefit" than any other communications channel?

</comment><comment><USER16> Jason Goldberg of Fab blogs regularly at [http://betashop.com/](http://betashop.com/) and is surprisingly open about his company and its progress.

</comment><comment><USER17> Ilya Grigorik ran an excellent programming blog while running PostRank (and continues to run it after being acquired by Google) [http://www.igvita.com/](http://www.igvita.com/)

</comment><comment><USER18> Jason Fried, 37signals in SVN? I'm not sure that's a good example. It's a bit of an outlier and SVN has components which go to their bottom line (selling books, jobs board.)

</comment><comment><USER19> Why is this treated like some insight? People who are running big successful companies are too busy to do a lot of stuff, blogging just yet another thing.

</comment><comment><USER20> I think the primary point is that the successful founders we can think of don't blog _regularly_. I could think of a few exceptions to this that have been mentioned in other comments (Freedman, Musk, Spolsky, etc). However of the exceptions even fewer blog on a regular basis.

There will always be exceptions to this and I hope people don't read remarks like Keith's as how-to guides. It's only a pattern that fits the mold. Don't think that your time is always too precious to 'share insights & experiences' as Hunter stated. That should have its time and place as well. It's very helpful to outsiders such as myself.

</comment><comment><USER21> There is no real causation between blog posting and the success of an entrepreneur but there may be a correlation between success entrepreneurs and whether they are likely to blog. At the end of the day, I don't think it matters. The CEO's transparency and image is all depending on what company it is. The CEO of IBM is less likely to blog than the CEO of Airbnb (I don't know if either of them blog, it's just a comparison).

</comment><comment><USER22> <generalization alert>

Writers tend to be high-ideaphoria people. This should be pretty obvious.

In my experience, many successful businesspeople are not high-ideaphoria people. They may be very smart, talented, etc., but their tendency is toward singular focus, rather than an exploration of the interplay of ideas. So it seems natural they would tend not to write/blog. (And yes, I realize there are many exceptions, James Altucher being my favorite.)

</comment><comment><USER23> Typical Rabois shock-truthiness but he's really just playing with definitions.

In the resulting argument thread, he just labels as "corporate blog posts" any example of a successful entrepreneur who actually does blog.

What he's probably right about is that when they blog it's mainly about their business. But that's a very different, much more limited and not as shocking claim than "nobody successful blogs".

<comment><USER24> I understood his point to be that successful CEOs don't have time to blog about how to kick ass, or lessons learned running a company, or the usual self-promoting topics we see so much of here.

</comment></comment><comment><USER25> Slightly meta, but this is one of the many topics that (1) will continued to be debated and (2) always draw attention. The problem with these statements is a fundamental issue with definitions.

What does successful mean? Raised a million in funding? Sold company for a million?

What is a blog? Is a magazine/newspaper turned digital considered a blog? Does a press release written by someone else count?

What is an entrepreneur considered? Someone who just started a company (less than 1 year)? Someone who's started 40 companies over 30 years?

Probably the most well known entrepreneur blog by what is considered a highly successful entrepreneur, is Richard Branson - [http://www.virgin.com/richard- branson](http://www.virgin.com/richard-branson) \- but as far as I can tell he doesn't actually write any of it himself.

</comment><comment><USER26> You know, when you make an interesting statement like this one, you have to keep quiet and let it sink. Let others debate on it and such. Go on with your day. But if you keep arguing and arguing, it loses all its value.

He should have gone to sleep after that.

</comment><comment><USER27> Reasons that I did not blog when I ran a company:

1) I'm a poor writer 2) Any insights that I shared would benefit my competitors and would be insignificant for customers

37signals is an outlier because their readers are potential customers

<comment><USER28> > 37signals is an outlier because their readers are potential customers

Your readers are _always_ potential customers.

<comment><USER29> Yes, as in anyone you meet in the street is a potential costumer. So this is a very weak counter-argument. But there are companies that have more economic value in maintaining a blog than others, YC, 37 signals, and other companies that market directly to people who work in the same business, will benefit more from famous blog posts from their CEOs than B2C companies or B2B companies that develop products for companies in different fields.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER30> It really depends how you see success... "Success is working towards a predetermined goal" Earl Nightingale How much money does a CEO need to make to be deemed successful? For me people like Ryan Carson are successful because he is on a journey and whilst I admit he doesn't blog now as often as he used too, when he does blog it is about the journey he is on. Mark Suster I would deem successful irrelevant of how much money he has and his blog is brilliant and regular and a great read for any entrepreneur. Just my thoughts :)

</comment><comment><USER31> I thought that was the whole point of Daniel Lyons's Fake Steve Jobs blog: that Jonathan Schwartz being a blogging CEO was counter-pointed by Real Steve Jobs as a non-blogging CEO.

<comment><USER32> The genius of Steve Jobs was that he only had to send a few words from his iPhone and others would do the blogging for him.

</comment></comment><comment><USER32> Surely the more important question is, "is the % of successful entrepreneurs who write blogs moving up or down".

If you think back to the 90s before "blogging" was a thing, the number of entrepreneurs who blogged was approximately 0%.

You could probably rewind to 1995 and say something like "Few successful businesses have a website" but would it naturally follow that investing in a website was a waste of time?

</comment><comment><USER33> I think he's largely correct beyond just VC-backed companies, though he did seem to go back and forth between "personal" blogging and company blogging. On a side note, I found his definition of success to be typical of an investor: If you get them a return, you're successful (oh, and "changing the world" means getting them a return). Pretty boring definition of success.

</comment><comment><USER34> Elon Musk? Mark Shuttleworth?

</comment><comment><USER35> Viral B2C startups don't require blogs to grow. If your business requires a blog(it requires sales), it is probably B2B, or B2C with linear growth which takes a while and is likely not done by the CEO but by staff. Thus none of the unicorn models actually require a blogging CEO. A server scaling or coding CEO though would definitely fit the bill.

</comment><comment><USER36> Jason Cohen a.k.a "asmartbear" blogs regularly and he was the CEO of WPEngine before handing over the reins to a new CEO.

</comment><comment><USER37> A parallel statement could be said about Wikipedia. I bet if you're a world- class expert at something, probably the last thing you want to do when you get home after a hard days work is log to Wikipedia and edit articles and deal with mods.

Still, Wikipedia manages to maintain a not-bad-for-a-first-try quality level on most science-y topics.

</comment><comment><USER38> In my view, statements like this are _thin air_. People shouldn't even bother to comment seriously on them because they lack context.

Until I am 100% sure what Keith means by the words "successful" and "regularly", I can't comment nor I can take anyone else's comment on such a broad statement seriously.

</comment><comment><USER39> I wish more did, but I suspect there is a good reason they don't. There is liability in what they say. And when dealing with lots of money it's easier to say nothing publicly.

[offtopic] Wow I hate reading twitter threads, I wish there was an easier and better way to see related tweets and connect who is talking to who inline.

</comment><comment><USER40> just drop the word entrepreneur, and this claim is very plausible

i hate it when a shop owner calls herself CEO, CEO should only be used for very large organizations

yet even if you own a miserably failing business (success is in the eye of the beholder), you can still call yourself entrepreneur, i think keith just overestimate the term entrepreneur

</comment><comment><USER41> Probably a far greater proportion of successful entrepreneurs blog than bloggers among the general population.

</comment><comment><USER42> He expressed this on twitter, which can be characterized as a microblog. I'd hazard a guess that fewer people blog and instead address the kinds of comments in shorter form mediums.

This seems like a general trend, and "CEOs and entrepreneurs" are probably just following that general trend.

</comment><comment><USER43> There's one from Tim Cook on HN right now: [http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702304...](http://online.wsj.com/news/article_email/SB10001424052702304527504579172302377638002-lMyQjAxMTAzMDAwMjEwNDIyWj)

<comment><USER9> I would have said "an opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal with Tim Cook's byline." Nothing indicates that he wrote it himself (though he may have reviewed it before submission).

</comment></comment><comment><USER44> While I generally disagree with the sentiment, his observation for the subset he's talking about -- "world changers", e.g. Jack Dorsey, Evan Williams, Zuckerberg, Brian Chesky, Drew Houston, etc -- is correct.

</comment><comment><USER45> Damn I'd better stop blogging. I want to make sure I'm successful.

<comment><USER46> I think you got the Cause-Effect process backwards; when you are successful you will be too busy to blog, but to be successful, initially, you need to market yourself and your products through blogs...

<comment><USER47> I think that may be the joke. Though this is the text, so I'm not sure.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER48> Actually, "successful" isn't a good criteria. Any entrepreneur who is on their way to success, or trying to be successful should be counted.

The lessons on the path to success are many, and they are varied.

</comment><comment><USER49> I'm not sure if he would qualify on the exact metrics mentioned, but certainly in the general sense: Fred Wilson, [http://www.avc.com/](http://www.avc.com/)

</comment><comment><USER50> Gary Vaynerchuk (garyvaynerchuk.com) blogs all the time and runs a highly successful, high growth marketing agency. Although, he mostly video blogs which can take less time than writing if you are good.

<comment><USER51> His business was built on blogging and vlogging, it's at the core of how he makes money and markets his products. Not the best example because, of course he still blogs and vlogs.

<comment><USER50> Very true. There is an obvious ROI for him. However, he is one of the busiest guys I know and still manages to make it happen. Regardless of incentive, it shows it is possible to manage both a high growth start up and a powerful personal brand.

</comment></comment></comment><comment><USER52> Agreed. Blogging is a tool of the mediocre. It's like the blind leading the blind. And those who do have a clue are trying to manipulate you to their hidden agenda.

</comment><comment><USER53> dhh is the first example that comes to my mind.

Interesting point, but I think it's still probably important for early stage startups to blog. It helps get them exposure and increase their luck surface area ([http://www.codusoperandi.com/posts/increasing-your-luck- surf...](http://www.codusoperandi.com/posts/increasing-your-luck-surface- area)). Things probably change when you get really big though.

</comment><comment><USER54> Does Alex Turnbull, CEO of Groove count?

[http://www.groovehq.com/blog](http://www.groovehq.com/blog)

</comment><comment><USER55> Jacob Thomason of RentPost.com - [http://jacobt.com/](http://jacobt.com/)

</comment><comment><USER56> Recently SEC approved Twitter for disclosing material information. I wonder how many CEOs etc will use it.

</comment><comment><USER57> You can talk about it. You can do it. If your doing isn't talking, then you aren't doing it.

</comment><comment><USER58> What's the level of "success" he's talking about?

Millions? Billions? Yacht & Helicopter money?

</comment><comment><USER59> I wasted 10 minutes reading that entire thread. Probably could have written a blog post in that time.

<comment><USER29> ... Well, but you probably are procrastinating. Writing a blog is a creative effort. And in 10 minutes you only can write a very short or unoriginal blog post...

</comment></comment><comment><USER60> Joel Gascoine and Leo Widrich from Buffer do. Essential part of their routine and business practice.

</comment><comment><USER61> Dick Costolo tweets. Close enough.

</comment><comment><USER62> Mark Cuban, anyone?

</comment><comment><USER63> Ben Horowitz?

</comment><comment><USER64> Surprised by the ideas.</comment>


Ask HN: Is it possible for a startup to be too lean? - <AUTHOR>

I was wondering if it is possible for a startup to be too lean? Is it possible for a startup to be so tight with compensation that they can not afford to hire the talent they need? <comment><USER2> > I was wondering if it is possible for a startup to be too lean?

I'd say that's very dependant on each individual scenario. For instance, if the MVP(minimal viable product) is built by just the technical founders in spare time and there is no time limit/urgency, then the answer is that it can't be too lean. On the other hand, let's say that the MVP is still built by the founders, but they are working on it full time, then the startup can be too lean. The less developers working on the project, the longer it'll take to finish the product. Even if the founders are okay with not paying themselves, their personal bills still have to be paid, so there's a built in deadline that has to be met there for positive cash flow/ investment.

The same would apply to if there were paid hires. You can pay one employee a salary of X and finish the project in Y amount of time, or you can hire 2 employees for a total salary of 2X and finish the project in Y/2 amount of time. If salary is your only expense then it doesn't matter if you're lean. However, if you need to pay rent, electricity, hosting, etc, then the faster the project is done the better and being too lean may hurt you.

Again, all depends on the case at hand. Is there cash flow, are employees getting paid, is there an urgent delivery date, are there external expenses, etc.

</comment><comment><USER3> Yes, but I'd wager they would fail rapidly.

For actual hard problems that require top talent (in opposition to your normal 'rockstars wanted'), a startup would need:

A. Enough talent among the founders to make a demo good enough to get enough investment to get the talent to make the product

or

B. Enough starting capital to make a demo to get investment to get the talent

</comment><comment><USER4> I clicked this thinking you meant lean as in the Lean Methodology of build, measure, learn.

Sure a company can be too tight when they are "bootstrapping" initially.

</comment><comment><USER5>
      lean != starved

</comment><comment><USER6> of course, its a trade off between getting it done and not</comment>