Japan pays Foriegn Workers to leave

[Cops]

Why are you comparing absolute numbers of unemployed instead of relative ones? Canada's unemployment rate is 8%, USA's is 8.5%.

America's population is 9 times bigger than that of Canada. Am I the only one seeing that it's pretty obvious that America would have more unemployed people in absolute terms?

I also think your reasoning about the 'immigrant threat' to economic growth is based on thin air. There are plenty of examples of countries where 'newcomers' have substantially contributed to extra economic growth, see Britain for example. Closing your doors to other people willing to take jobs is a form of protectionism, and that is exactly what will hold a nation back on the road to a quick economic recovery.

I didn't say close them completely, I'm not sure if i said this, I think I did but I want to tighten restrictions on how many people we let in.

There's no jobs, why are we going to let a shit ton of people into this country who have no education or money to support our economy? The systems being bled by the current residents, give it a short amount of time and the flood gates to our country will be right back open.

Interesting enough, Canada does make money off immigrants. Think about it, if every person comes to Canada and spends $100 we've just injected 25 Million dollars into our economy. And a good chunk of that is going to be tax dollars. Canada has the highest immigration rate in the world, we take in approximately 200,000 - 260,000 people a year. A number I'm deeply proud of.

Assuming 'some' people come to this country with more than that we've just stimulated the fuck out of our economy. And even better than that, when someone gets a job they're now paying taxes, which gives our government more money to create even better services.

Immigration is vital to Canada's growth and prosperity, all I'm saying is that right now, at this moment it doesn't make sense to let a shit load of people into this country. I'm saying is pull back the percentages a bit and wait till things start rolling again.

Edit:

Sorry for the ridiculously long post, but think about it like this; why let people in this country on the promise of a job and prosperity when there's little to none to be had? Sorry to be a dick, but enough countries sell people on this promise and it doesn't really exist. Canada does offer great services and the ability to really establish yourself in this country, and the last thing I want to do is lead someone on a false promise.

When the economy picks up and industries aren't laying people off right left and center, then that's when you want more people in your country to bring their wealth and in tern get on the grid and start paying taxes. It's like a double punch of economic boost, the economy picks up and new immigrants money (regardless of how little it is) stimulates our economy. The greatest thing about my country is that it is still HIGHLY underdeveloped, and that there is lots and lots of space for areas to become developed.

[Cops]

what do you mean when you speak of government investment? where does the capital come from (assuming it is not bled away from taxpayers by a cancerous government)? what industries are the right industries, and how would you prevent a 'bubble' from forming?

i know you're not an economist, but neither are the people who will decide all these answers. take a stab.

I'd like to address this post when I have the time. I'll be honest I read it, I know what my answer is going to be, but I have to catch a bus in five minutes otherwise I'm going to be ridiculously late for a dinner party tonight.

[Epinephrine]

Just going to double post;

I realize Canada doesn't have the population or immigration problem that America has, and for that reason it's easier for us to control our economy and more importantly our growth. It's a rigid conservative approach that ensures that the people who were born and live here won't be outright competing with newcomers. Certainly we invoke competition and professionals to come to this country, considering we tend to not have enough people for the amount of jobs in this country. However, it's politically, economically, socially, and immorally wrong to open your doors to people looking for work when we have Canadian born citizens struggling to find employment.

The dynamics of our two countries are very different, I understand this, but in some ways Canada is and will always be economically and politically more stable than America. This has everything to do with population, and geography.

Uhhh... I think you've officially gone crazy Cops. But I guess you are bitter cause you will be unemployed soon so I can see why, it sucks to have no job.

Canada is more politically stable? Didn't we almost break the country into two 15 years ago? Don't we sort of have the same us vs them political mentality in this country, except it's actually us vs. them vs. Quebec?

Canada is more economically stable? Our economy vastly relies on the USA for it's health. In Q1 Canada's GDP just dropped about 7.5% at an annualized rate, far higher than the USA. We're getting hammered in this recession.

The government can't control our export led and increasingly foreign owned economy. We've already spent billions and billions bailing out the auto companies in the past decade in Ontario, and what did it get us? It got our factories closed first because the head office is in Detroit and so it's always America first when it push comes to shove. We're also one of the only major economies in the world where the government really does nothing to stop foreigners from owning our major corporations (aside from a few key sectors like telecommunications), breaking them up, and selling them for pieces in the global market.

Furthermore you want us to cancel our immigration policy? It's not like people who land in Canada as immigrants suddenly become citizens overnight and thus get welfare. You need certain reasons to come to Canada, whether you are in the investor class, have a job lined up, or are family class. It's quite hard to get into this country, you need a good education (university level or higher generally) and have money. Or else if you're family class, this means that you make it worthwhile for the other highly skilled immigrants to come, because who wants to move to a country if their wife/husband/kids can't come along with them?

If we want to reverse our immigration policy (which already is backlogged with millions who are waiting in line around the world) we'll just shoot ourselves in the foot later on, when all these people decide to move somewhere else. Actually now is the perfect time for Canada to continue to let immigrants in, so that the very best get into our country as they can't get in anywhere else.

Well I guess I wouldn't care if we stopped letting in refugees for a while, that's not a big deal to me.

[Xog]

cops i thought you had a job/internship at a news/newspaper thing?

[Cops]

Uhhh... I think you've officially gone crazy Cops. But I guess you are bitter cause you will be unemployed soon so I can see why, it sucks to have no job.

Bitter? I'm optimistic about my ability to find money or work in any given field, I don't doubt my talents what so ever. I was just awarded (tonight) the best ENG Cameraman Award in my entire program, this award not only sets myself apart from my peers but it looks fucking amazing on my resume.

My bitterness is relatively low, and rather than bitching all the time I'm working, for free in hopes of finding a job. Do you know what it's like to lose double money. Not am I only losing money to work for free, but I'm losing even more money trying to supplement my cost of living. I don't know dude, I doubt you had to do any of that, so maybe if you were in my shoes you'd realize that I'm a lot less bitter than I deserve to be.

Canada is more politically stable? Didn't we almost break the country into two 15 years ago? Don't we sort of have the same us vs them political mentality in this country, except it's actually us vs. them vs. Quebec?

Canada is more economically stable? Our economy vastly relies on the USA for it's health. In Q1 Canada's GDP just dropped about 7.5% at an annualized rate, far higher than the USA. We're getting hammered in this recession.

The government can't control our export led and increasingly foreign owned economy. We've already spent billions and billions bailing out the auto companies in the past decade in Ontario, and what did it get us? It got our factories closed first because the head office is in Detroit and so it's always America first when it push comes to shove. We're also one of the only major economies in the world where the government really does nothing to stop foreigners from owning our major corporations (aside from a few key sectors like telecommunications), breaking them up, and selling them for pieces in the global market.

Quebec is part of Canada, and this will not change for, a long, long time. Most people in this country just want a government that leaves them the fuck alone, and for the most part Canada hasn't done anything overwhelmingly stupid to garnish us International attention (except for that pilot from Thunder Bay). You can pull up an incidence where A PM said something, or someone did something, but when you look at what certain countries have or still currently do we're not even on that radar.

Also, if our leaders step out of line the balance of power has been able to re-shift it and force parties out. I think our current government is a special case, but I have no doubt that once that tards gone we'll have a Liberal government that provide us with the mediocre politics we've come accustom to.

Economically we provide our citizens a higher standard of living. The middle class if you will, is represented more clearly in Canada than America.

Our housing market is a lot safer, and our economic policies are a lot more stringent. If anything can be said is that we manage the books better, but in all fairness it's easier to do with our population size.

We have the space and natural resources to continuously grow, and once we realize this, or better yet act on it, then we can diversify our markets ( I've been saying this for years).

Let's not forget security. We live in a relatively safe country, I can't remember ever saying, in my entire life 'wow, Canada is unstable'.

Furthermore you want us to cancel our immigration policy? It's not like people who land in Canada as immigrants suddenly become citizens overnight and thus get welfare. You need certain reasons to come to Canada, whether you are in the investor class, have a job lined up, or are family class. It's quite hard to get into this country, you need a good education (university level or higher generally) and have money. Or else if you're family class, this means that you make it worthwhile for the other highly skilled immigrants to come, because who wants to move to a country if their wife/husband/kids can't come along with them?

I don't remember using the word cancel, what so ever.

The reality is that industries favor Canadian born and educated, so that's exactly why there's people with PHd's driving taxis. Tell me something, how is that someone from India who's a Doctor will help Canada, right now. Policy in place limits who can and can't get high level paying jobs in Canada. The fact is these professionals, aren't really professionals here.

I'm not going to argue the obvious of whether this is right or not, but realistically we're just going to immigrate a bunch of people into this country who spend what little cash they have, only to find out there's no opportunity or services provided for them? In a better economy it's easier for these people to strive for something better but immigrating a massive amount of people to this country, currently, is only going to turn people away from coming here in the future.

There's a lot of things wrong with this country, but it's clear to see why most countries favor grads from their own country.

Actually now is the perfect time for Canada to continue to let immigrants in, so that the very best get into our country as they can't get in anywhere else.

Why? There's no jobs and what exactly are they going to do in Canada. I don't get it, there's little to no jobs so tell me exactly why would someone come here when we'll likely tell them their degree, masters, or phd is a piece of shit? The only thing they can hope for is landing a decent paying job and working their way to getting their education certified, or just taking college/university courses at night, online, or on the weekends.

I think I can sum this entire thing up in one sentence, thanks Kolar.

the skilled professionals in this country has to be proportional to the economic needs of our country.

[Cops]

cops i thought you had a job/internship at a news/newspaper thing?

Un-paid internship, which will lead into another un-paid internship, and then another, and so on and so forth. To set yourself apart from the rest you have to dedicate 10-12 hours a day doing shit no one else wants to do, always saying yes, working weekends, working nights, volunteering on your weekends that are on a fucking Tuesday and Wednesday, and most of all doing it with a fucking smile.

That post, was in fact bitter, but I painted an ugly picture to make a point that shit sucks, but if I'm still finding a reason to wake up in the morning and give it my all then to me that speaks volume about my character and dedication.

[Epinephrine]

Bitter? I'm optimistic about my ability to find money or work in any given field, I don't doubt my talents what so ever. I was just awarded (tonight) the best ENG Cameraman Award in my entire program, this award not only sets myself apart from my peers but it looks fucking amazing on my resume.

Congrats on your award I hope you do well in your job in the future.

I thought you sounded a bit better because all your talk about 'why should we let immigrants in when we don't have jobs for Canadians' sounds like exactly what the Japanese are thinking. Although you're not saying we should pay people to leave Canada, it's relatively the same as Japan, as that country is starting from a lot lower baseline of immigrant acceptance.

Do you know what it's like to lose double money. Not am I only losing money to work for free, but I'm losing even more money trying to supplement my cost of living. I don't know dude, I doubt you had to do any of that, so maybe if you were in my shoes you'd realize that I'm a lot less bitter than I deserve to be.

Er.. I'm almost 28 and I'm $70,000 in debt and have not pulled in more than $5/hour since I worked at SilverCity when I was 20 (once you account for my mandatory registration fees and interest on loans). I think I know what it's like to work extremely hard while losing money.

and for the most part Canada hasn't done anything overwhelmingly stupid to garnish us International attention (except for that pilot from Thunder Bay). You can pull up an incidence where A PM said something, or someone did something, but when you look at what certain countries have or still currently do we're not even on that radar.

Well Canada's done a lot of dumb things domestically and internationally as of late. We're simply not as important as the USA for the rest of the world to really care what we do though.

I don't remember using the word cancel, what so ever.
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Well you didn't use the word cancel, I said that to characterize the tone in your post. Your post was basically: "we should stop letting/greatly slow down the number of immigrants getting into this country because we're in a recession". Well I'm sorry I don't buy it. We've been through worse recessions and worse unemployment before (we were >10% unemployment in the recession of the early 90s) and we never stopped letting people into this country or greatly turned down that number for the last few decades.

Canada was built on immigration, and as a first generation immigrant myself, I simply cannot accept your reasoning. Immigrants know that when they come here that things will be different. People aren't so stupid to think that they can move somewhere completely foreign and that things will work out perfectly fine as before, and suddenly because they have advanced degrees from their homelands that they will be recognized here. Most people who are smart enough to get PhDs and so on, will do research before they come here, and realize what they can get here. Yet even though they realize what they can get may be 'worse', relatively it is better due to quality of life, and hope for their children.

My parents had masters degrees that they never got to use when they came here to this country and in fact we even opened a Chinese restaurant and they had no idea how to run a restaurant. But they fully accepted that because they wanted to make sure that my brother and I didn't grow up in a communist country. I think most immigrants are like this. Sure some people will complain that they aren't happy here, and some leave, but the vast majority know what's up before they come.

On top of that immigration isn't a short term policy that's based on filling current unfilled jobs. It's a central tenant that our country holds dear, that we are a multicultural society that welcomes people from all around the world, and allows people to live the 'Canadian dream'. It's different from the 'anyone can be a billionaire' American dream, as the Canadian dream is you can come here from ANYWHERE and have one of the best quality of life in the world and be accepted by the people here as equals. It's that belief that allows the most enterprising of immigrants, and the children of immigrants to succeed very well in Canada and help make our country even better than it can be.

If we turn off our immigration taps, or even just turn it down quite a bit due to one recession, then we will damage our reputation as a place for people to come, and look more uninvited for those in the future. Reputation is important in these things, because to attract the best people around the world, we rely on our reputation of being welcoming to newcomers more than anything else. People will know if we don't want them to come here when times are tough and they will think perhaps we will also be harder on immigrants who are already here when times are tough too like Japan. It's simply not a good policy, especially when immigration is for the long-term health of the country.

And yes I do agree we should do more to help integrate even first generation immigrants to our country to use their talents to the fullest, but that's another debate and something we both agree on so no point talking about it.


Hey look, I love our country as much as you do, but it's not nearly as great a place as you say it to Jerome. I wouldn't say we're completely better in every way, and it would be foolish to be so smug. In fact with the new Obama administration, we're starting to look worse and worse with our official denial of global warming, our much worse drop in GDP and soon to surely be higher unemployment numbers.

[Cops]

Nice post, our current government is a fucking joke and I think we both agree on that. The quality of life is still relatively good in this country, we might be looking like shit, but the number and size of the problems that exist in America aren't even comparable to this country. People are losing their jobs but I think it's important to note that our housing market (which has a lot to do with stabilizing this problem) isn't in the gutter. Housing prices might be down but people aren't flooding the market with 'For Sale' signs. You can still get a great deal, however there isn't buses taking people around to homes who have been foreclosed.

Heh, I worked at SilverCity for a good 3-4 years... I remember, getting paid 25 cents more than everyone else to be a supervisor. I'm sorry to put you and your experiences down, but truthfully you make good money and have the ability to pay off your student loans relatively quick. I remember you saying this once, "student loans are all relative to what you can actually make once you graduate", I might be paraphrasing here but $70,000 might sound steep, but for a Doctor that isn't bad at all.

[Nycle]

Yet another beautiful discussion in a Canadian nationalist wrapping. This is getting old.

[Cops]

Yet another beautiful discussion in a Canadian nationalist wrapping. This is getting old.

I think this really has to do with a lot of countries, not just Japan or Canada. But when you're talking about immigration we do have the highest immigration rate so of course we have opinions on immigration laws and how it will help or not help our economy right now.

I still stand by this;

the skilled professionals in any country has to be proportional to the economic needs of that certain country.

and

telling people there's opportunity when there is none, and writing off their academic credentials is wrong.

I'm sorry I'm such a nationalist fucktard.

[Nycle]

@ Flabby, I disagree. Native people might be competing with immigrants on low-entry jobs, but what good does it do if companies are forced to take more expensive 'native' workers as a result of government policy? This will only postpone economic recovery.

Just to be clear, I am in no way suggesting that we immediately open up the floodgates to uncontrolled immigration, we all know that's going to cause major problems. I just want to point out that in times of recession, immigration control is usually one of the first 'solutions' presented by populists with little economic rationale behind it, besides scare tactics, of course. They are absolutely hypocritical for doing this because they don't complain when they have it good and are all too willing to ignore the invisible role that immigrants play in times of prosperity.

[Cops]

what do you mean when you speak of government investment? where does the capital come from (assuming it is not bled away from taxpayers by a cancerous government)? what industries are the right industries, and how would you prevent a 'bubble' from forming?

i know you're not an economist, but neither are the people who will decide all these answers. take a stab.

I PM'd you my answer.

edit: delete your PMs and you'll get it, you have a full inbox. I see where you want to take this and I'm not going to drag this thread out any further than me and Epinephrine already have.

[Epinephrine]

To get back on track, I actually quite Japan. Would be cool to work there, but my credentials aren't recognized there, it's next to impossible to emigrate there or even get a work visa there unless you have a huge corporation behind you because of Byzantine laws and besides my Japanese is nowhere near the level where I could be responsible in my profession. Oh well!

The really interesting thing about this whole thing is that the workers that they are now expelling really do just represent the level of immigration that they are willing to accept in Japan, which is 2nd and 3rd generation South Americans with Japanese ancestry. Like even these people are too foreign for native born Japanese, it's kind of sad.

There's also a million Korean-descended people who live in Japan, many of which have been intermarried with Japanese for generations and many have full Japanese names, yet are still recognized as foreigners and are discriminated against. From what I know, a lot of these people moved to Japan during those decades when the Japanese Empire ruled Korea.

[Nycle]

Why do you think it would be 'cool' to work in Japan?

Their suicide numbers are through the roof as a consequence of their crazy ass work ethic. They fail to enjoy life. They don't like outsiders. Even Koreans, their closest ethnic relatives who some of which apparently have lived there for decades if not centuries, are discriminated against because of their ethnicity. You are from Hong Kong right, what makes you think they'd treat someone with a southern Chinese ethnicity any better? I don't mean to feed your Canadian pride, but Canada is one of those few countries that are known to have a 'true' multicultural society. So I'd pick Canada over Japan any day.

The way some people are so intrigued by this country fascinates me. Their modern history is almost completely based on the adoption of a Western-style economy, so in that respect they're not even that different from us. Perhaps it's just their alien-like culture to the eyes of Westerners that makes them so 'cool'.

[Epinephrine]

Why do you think it would be 'cool' to work in Japan?

Their suicide numbers are through the roof as a consequence of their crazy ass work ethic. They fail to enjoy life. They don't like outsiders. Even Koreans, their closest ethnic relatives who some of which apparently have lived there for decades if not centuries, are discriminated against because of their ethnicity. You are from Hong Kong right, what makes you think they'd treat someone with a southern Chinese ethnicity any better? I don't mean to feed your Canadian pride, but Canada is one of those few countries that are known to have a 'true' multicultural society. So I'd pick Canada over Japan any day.

The way some people are so intrigued by this country fascinates me. Their modern history is almost completely based on the adoption of a Western-style economy, so in that respect they're not even that different from us. Perhaps it's just their alien-like culture to the eyes of Westerners that makes them so 'cool'.

I wouldn't want to live there long-term or raise a family there. But I think it's sufficiently different enough from my own life now for it to be pretty interesting for a few years. I also quite like the super technological aspect, and the awesome food.

Much like how a lot of (mostly white) people in North America think it's cool to work in random European cities, or how Europeans may come here to work for a few years or go to school, I think it would be cool to work in Japan. And no I wouldn't want to go there to be a salaryman, but to be in my chosen profession, which sadly I can't do so it's a moot point.

Hong Kong would be fun too, but I already know the culture very well so it wouldn't be as much of an adventure. Mainland China has a too low standard of living (pollution, social problems, healthcare, etc) for me so Japan is the most interesting.

While long-term Japan is a pretty closed place, superficially it's very welcoming and as long as I don't stay too long, it won't matter much to me. Like I doubt they'd treat me amazingly, but then again being a Chinese person I doubt I'd get an amazing reception in most of Europe (aside from London) either. Having traveled in Europe and seen just the general way people treat you because you're so foreign, I have an idea.

As much as a lot of Hong Kongers resent the Japanese for WWII-related crimes, a huge number of them love traveling to Japan for the shopping, the food and the sights.