Is Canada a Ripoff??? (houses, transfer, purchasing)

[ionlife]

Just a bit of trivia: some singer in Canada -- can't remember his name but he is on the top 40 here in the USA--has a good and cute song. Well he said he lives in Canada, but he does his business stuff out of the USA because he makes MORE MONEY that way.


Things that make you go hmmmm....

[Foreverking]

Originally Posted by mikeyyc

Uhh, it's not free. You pay out the butt in taxes for it. State Universities are comparable cost wise for in state students to Canadian schools.

well, in the us I pay over 800 a month for health insurance and its going up. If I lose my job, I will have to pay even more. In canada, I can at least know that if my child gets sick, I can take him to the doctor. Right now things are so bad here in the states, that Im going to have to give up my health insurance.

[ionlife]

I'd shop around for different insurance--COBRA? And definitely contact your local state/city officials to see if you are eligible for the programs that are already in existence for these type of situations. And if you belong to a church, go to your Pastor/Priest and ask for assistance/help to get you by until you find another job.

[Galloway]

Originally Posted by Foreverking

well, in the us I pay over 800 a month for health insurance and its going up. If I lose my job, I will have to pay even more. In canada, I can at least know that if my child gets sick, I can take him to the doctor. Right now things are so bad here in the states, that Im going to have to give up my health insurance.

No you will not be able to take your child to the doctor, there wil be a huge lineup and since everybody in this country gets the same treatment he will lay there with his condition getting worse, then maybe after 15 hours you will be able to see a doctor, that provides very poor service.

[Foreverking]

Originally Posted by Galloway

No you will not be able to take your child to the doctor, there wil be a huge lineup and since everybody in this country gets the same treatment he will lay there with his condition getting worse, then maybe after 15 hours you will be able to see a doctor, that provides very poor service.

TO be honest, I have had to wait up to 7 hours at the ER. A visit to the ER after insurance can still cost me 3-4 houndred dollars, depending on what they do. Keep in mind that I don't know those doctors either.

[ionlife]

Actually, I just looked up the amount of money that is spent on the budget in the USA-- on healthcare for non elderly--and I realized that emergency visits mean less having to prove eligibility for care on medicaid... my personal opinion of ER visits is ... go urgent care if you can! the waits are awful... not sure what state you're in ForeverKing, but check out your eligiblity with your child at least for health care... you'd be surprised. A more poor state is eligible for more dollars... children are more eligible than adults...

researching has made me ... well ... think we spend a lot on medical care -- more GDP than canada, but mismanagement?? might affect care. universal care is not the right "words" for what we need...

less bureaucracy and better education for people about how to use services is needed.

[The_gateway]

Originally Posted by ajau

Just wondering if anyone else thinks that Canada in general is a ripoff??? I love Canada and all, but when you compare the cost for just about anything from fresh food to gasoline to going out, it doesn't compare to the US or even Europe for many things... I find we get less value for our dollar and we pay more for lesser quality... I won't even mention the housing costs... It's as if the country is still priced for a Canadian dollar valued at $0.65 US... What's the problem with Canada?

I think it's the fact that we have far less people spread out over a far greater land mass. That would be one reason why we have such higher prices for the same products.
As for housing, again same thing. We either have too many people trying to cram into a small area (Vancouver), or we have very few people in one particular area. (prairies).
In the case of the prairies, having too few new houses being built would probably add to the building costs.

[ajau]

Originally Posted by The_gateway

I think it's the fact that we have far less people spread out over a far greater land mass. That would be one reason why we have such higher prices for the same products.
As for housing, again same thing. We either have too many people trying to cram into a small area (Vancouver), or we have very few people in one particular area. (prairies).
In the case of the prairies, having too few new houses being built would probably add to the building costs.

You mention though that many Canadian's cram into cities like Vancouver. Wouldn't that reduce transportation costs? As well, most Canadian people live near US cities anyways... Vancouver-Seattle, Toronto-Buffalo, Windsor-Detroit, etc. Transportation be minimally more expensive between Vancouver and Seattle but certainly not to the point to drive up the cost of a vehicle by 25%...

As for housing, you would think that many areas in the US experience similar issues... For instance, North Dakota is mighty similar to Saskatchewan, from climate to population distribution, distances to even economy (oilpatch), but housing is much cheaper in ND than Sask...

[The_gateway]

Originally Posted by ajau

You mention though that many Canadian's cram into cities like Vancouver. Wouldn't that reduce transportation costs? As well, most Canadian people live near US cities anyways... Vancouver-Seattle, Toronto-Buffalo, Windsor-Detroit, etc. Transportation be minimally more expensive between Vancouver and Seattle but certainly not to the point to drive up the cost of a vehicle by 25%...

As for housing, you would think that many areas in the US experience similar issues... For instance, North Dakota is mighty similar to Saskatchewan, from climate to population distribution, distances to even economy (oilpatch), but housing is much cheaper in ND than Sask...

Well for cars, it might be simply fewer people available to buy cars...10x the population of Americans can drive down a cars price significantly vs. 10x fewer Canucks.

As for the houses I simply don't know...I've been scratching my head on that one, because ND and SK are very similar population wise......could it simply be more people are moving to Sask, thereby driving the price up on a house? I heard SK is booming.

[kkgg7]

Originally Posted by The_gateway

Well for cars, it might be simply fewer people available to buy cars...10x the population of Americans can drive down a cars price significantly vs. 10x fewer Canucks.

As for the houses I simply don't know...I've been scratching my head on that one, because ND and SK are very similar population wise......could it simply be more people are moving to Sask, thereby driving the price up on a house? I heard SK is booming.

Aren't more cars actually made in Ontario than in Michigan? I believe it is the tax, not the "cost".

It is easy to explain ND vs SK. In the US, they have so many options with it comes to which city to live in. Regina may be a relatively big city in Canada (17th largest), but Fargo. ND with similar population, is nowhere near even a medium-sized city (actually many americans may not even know where it is).

Vancouver is expensive not because it is "pretty" (so many prettier places in the US at half the price tag), but because it is the only non-frigid large city (I don't use the word "warm" to confuse it with say San Diego as it does get -10 degrees and LOTs of snow occasionally) in the country, other than Vancouver, you see 4-6 months of snow, period.

Toronto and Chicago have similar population, economy and weather. However, Chicago is considered frigid in the US, while Toronto is considered to have "mild" winter (yea, how come -30C windchill is "mild"). In other words, Chicago in terms of weather is very undesireable in the US while Toronto is desireable because it is the best of the worst, which partly explains at least a 50% price difference between these two cities. Of course weather is not the only factor. Toronto in terms of job and pay is the best you can get in Canada. Nothing comes even close to it. While Chicago doesn't have such a golden status. There is New York, Los Angeles, San Fran, Boston, Austin, Houston, Dallas, Seattle, Philly, Atlanta, etc etc. People have so many to choose from, and they will chose the best for them. It took me about 2 minutes to decide to settle in Toronto before moving here. (Vancouver-no jobs, poor pay, high price; Montreal" too cold, French, yes 2 minutes to rule them out. There is really nothing else to consider since I won't live in cities with less than 1 million residents). If I was going to the US, I need to spend at least 2 weeks to decide where I'd like to settle, weighing the pros and cons.

In the end, it is all about competition. Canada doesn't have much of that and companies simply aren't under the pressure to cut costs and attract customers at better prices. If Shoppers or Metro are to open a store in the US under their current operation mode, they can't survive there. They will be wiped out instantly. Is it because "there are fewer customers so they can't afford to cut price"? hardly. Look at the cellphone industry. Used to be an oligopolistic market. With new entrance of Wind, Virgin etc, Rogers and Bell can't control the market any more.

That's why Target's entry into the Canadian market is such great news. Canadian retailers are getting nervous because they won't be able to sit their comfortably charging outrageous prices any longer.
Target threatens sales of other Canadian retailers - The Globe and Mail

The quinessential Canadian company is probably the TTC. It has no competition, it has its stupid union behind its back. So it doesn't bother care what its customers think of it. They can't be fired and they WILL get a raise each year no matter how horrible its operates. They have a pathetic 2.5 subway lines to operate yet never lose of chance to humiliate itself by constantly running delays every couple of days. They have NO incentive whatsoever to cut costs, because why bother? When ticket collectors want to bump his salary from 60K to $65K, they just raise fare, or they strike. Fortunately not all companies are as powerful (and incompetent) as the TTC.

So stop using "we have a smaller market" to justify everything. The real questions is, are all these companies doing all they can to cut costs and to operate as efficiently as possible? Of course not. It only happens when the market has full competition. No one wants that kind of competition a,d they just need to be forced into it, like most American companies are.