kevin041

Forgive me if this has been asked before, OR if you feel that it is an ambiguous question, but if you had a choice of living anywhere in the US or anywhere in Canada, would you choose the US, or would you choose Canada, and why?

Thank you.

neilg14

Canada in the summer, Arizona or Nevada in the winter and the why is because I work outside and the cold here hurts like hell in my joints.

Jerseygirl

That would depend if you had a chance of getting a visa to live in the US or Canada. It is much harder to obtain a visa for the US.

mandymoochops

The US is notoriously difficult to immigrate to, so based on that factor alone the majority who would be pondering this choice would have to go for Canada.

If you've visited both countries then I suspect you wouldn't be asking this question, so I am going to assume that you haven't.

Ask yourself what you are looking for out of life (I'm also going to presume its for the following - better quality of life, better place to bring up the children, the UK has gone up the swanny, houses are cheaper and you feel that you would get more bang for your buck).

I don't know about the US but unless you have a ton of cash behind you or a rock solid guaranteed job offer - you might want to think twice about moving out East (ie Nova Scotia) a massive amount of expats that move out there (who love it btw) but find themselves having to move out West (AB SK BC) to make ends meet. Thats about as much info as I can give!

bc_guy

As someone who has lived in both countries, I'd say Canada. Well, it really depends on which part of Canada since it's a very big country. I liked the area of Canada I lived in because people seemed to be genuinely friendly for the most part. There were a few tossers but that number is significantly lower than the number of tossers I met in the USA. Not only that, but I found Canadians to be more realistic and have way more common sense and basic education than Americans.

Again, I have to stress that my experience falls more into a city comparison, not a country comparison. But based on what's out there in the media, I feel far safer, more secure and more at ease in Canada than I do in the USA. If I become a Canadian citizen and got legal entitlement to live where I used to in Canada, I wouldn't even care if I never went back to the US again. Relative to Canada, the benefits of living in the US are overwhelmingly outweighed by the troubles of living there (in my opinion anyway). Ever since I've lived in Canada, I now cringe whenever I think about America and Americans overall. I respect the US orders of magnitude more than my own country, yet they still make me cringe and shake my head in utter disbelief of their virtual stupidity and willful ignorance.

scrubbedexpat091

I'd ideally choose the US (I can live there but choose not to) in San Diego, but Canada offers certain things that improve quality of life, so I could never have the same quality of life in the US as I do in Canada.

Plus my girlfriend can't live in the US without going bankrupt because of health issues.

nicolasta

Canada for me. I left USA after 5 years because I didn't want to start and raise a family there. I am now moving to Canada in order to avail of a better quality of life for my family. It really depends on your personal motivations and drivers.

dbd33

US. It's warmer. Although not any of the parts north of Canada.

magnumpi

U are RICH I claim my $5

MarylandNed

I have lived in both. I'm also a citizen of both and so have the choice you mention. Although I currently live in the US (Maryland, just outside DC), I actually preferred living in Canada (Toronto). Being a part of a family means compromise and I don't think I could convince my wife to move back to Canada as she got fed up with the longer winters. Financially, I think we're better off in the US but that won't be true of everyone - much depends on your personal situation. However, there's always the sense here (US) that you're not far from living on the streets if things go wrong (e.g. a job loss or healthcare bills). With 4 kids, I certainly could not live in the US without decent health insurance.

colchar

colchar

Personally I would choose Canada without hesitation. I would never live in the US for any reason.

dbd33

That's a bit of an extreme position. You're being asked to judge the tiniest of differences, like choosing between 1% yoghurt and the full blown 2%. Unless you have an expensive medical condition you could go for years without noticing which country you were in.

MarylandNed

Yeah - I could live quite happily in either country but that wouldn't be true of everyone. While it wouldn't bother me, I can't see a rapid Republican from Georgia being happy about living in a country with higher sales taxes, stricter gun control and universal healthcare. Similarly some Canadians would not want to move south for higher crime and no universal healthcare. To each their own.

JamesM

If healthcare and gun control factor into the OP's decision then they should be remaining in the UK and not looking at either Canada or the US.