Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Same for the company I work for. I used to have 5 weeks + stats, but it changed to something called 'Flex-time'. This basically means we can take as much as we want, so long as the work is done. The nice part is that it's related to bonus, depending on billable hours. If you take less vacation then you receive a higher bonus. I usually take 4-5 weeks and still end up with a bonus. Most people here are happy to take lots of vacation time.

This is in IT, where here at least there is a big demand for staff that is forcing companies to be competitive, but I think they're seeing the benefits of offering flexibility for their staff, based on morale and lack of staff turn over.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

True enough. Bit bluntly put, but true enough. There is no point lamenting how worse things are in Canada. However it is useful to understand that a lower vacation entitlement is likely to be the case before emigrating. Part of the homework one needs to do.

.

Erm massive generalisation klaxon. And no more true for Canada, as a whole than it is for UK as a whole.

Well yes, and of course no. Ability to negotiate on vacation is a factor of role, experience, how badly a company wants to employ you vs how badly you need the job and corporate culture & policy. Some larger employers for example are unlikely to flex the policy for one particularly important new hire. Plus of course a junior/clerical/retail/hospitality role, as examples, probably has less leverage to negotiate anything.

Note something that a "top producer" such as yourself ever has to bother with I'm sure. Out of curiosity, what do you "produce"?

Again true if a little blunt. Being an informed consumer (or immigrant) is essential for an eyes open immigration experience. This board can, at times help with that.

Welcome by the way. Care to tell us something more about yourself?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Much of your client experience I think is with US companies? My take is that vacation & general employment conditions are worse in the US than Canada. As in most things Canada follows the US lead, watered down a bit. Perhaps CETA will encourage a more European approach.;)

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

By revenue, about 80% with 5% of income coming from inside Canada. By time at desk in client's office, about 60% in Canada. Geographically, I've sat at desks in all but 6 States but only in 3 Provinces. Dozens of US firms, maybe 10 enterprises in Canada. That's the nature of the North American economy.

I agree with this but think the gap between employment conditions in the UK and that in Canada is much greater than that between Canada and the US. The one feature of the Canadian job market I think unusual, apart from the limited time off, is the rampant nepotism. Even large firms take on the children of employees as summer students and then make them lifetime employees despite there being better candidates queuing around the block. They'll promote this as "supporting the local community" or similar.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Oh yes, that was kind of the point. I haven't looked but wonder whether the US immigration board has the perennial "only 2 weeks vacation? Tell me it 'aint so?" threads?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I'm sure it does but I expect the "how do live without healthcare?", "the nearest place to San Francisco I can afford to live is in Iowa, how do I commute?", "I can get a house in Detroit/Buffalo/Winston Salem for $40,000, is there a catch?" and "my employer is giving me an education allowance of under $100,000 for my children, can I really afford to send them both to school in Manhattan?" threads are more plentiful.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Complaints by immigrants like this one of, 'why can't I have 5 weeks vacation' just indicate to me a basic difference in cultural norms. In the UK, people may see that as an entitlement along with many other entitlements they are used to having in the Nanny State they grew up in. But this is not the Nanny State. You left there and came to Canada presumably because you believed you would have a better life.

The question is how did you expect to get that better life? If you expected it to be handed to you as an entitlement, then you are in the wrong country. I stand by what I wrote, you get what you want by doing what you need to do to get it, not by being mediocre or sitting back and complaining it should be given to you. Some may say I am being blunt. OK, I'm blunt, so what? Blunt leaves no room for ambiguity.


Dbd33, you wrote, "Even when compensation is based directly upon billings generated that is not a level playing field as the person with the best connections is best placed to generate the most billings"

That to me is not contradictory at all to what I wrote, that you are rewarded based on productivity. I don't care how someone generated the most billings, all that matters is that they did. If they have an advantage over others in who they know, that's what gets them the rewards over others. If someone is more intelligent than others and employs that intelligence to produce more, should they only be rewarded the same as someone who produces less? What advantage someone has and is smart enough to use, is what makes the difference. There is no such thing as a level playing field and I for one certainly would never have wanted to play on one. Why would I?

If you must talk about vacation rather than the actual underlying principles that making the complaint actually indicates, then let's tell it like it is.

I have yet to meet a Canadian who did not want more days off. If any comment is simply not true, the statement that, "Canadians do not value holidays and tend not to take them" is that statement at least for the first part. What differs is that they value something else more. It may be bigger house or a new car or whatever but they choose what matters more to them over finding a way to work less days.

Nor are all Canadians the same in that regard. There are plenty of Canadians who want to work less and play more but that comes at a price. You don't get to say, I want to be entitled to 5 weeks vacation as a mediocre producer. That simply ain't gonna happen.

A bricklayer can go and work in a city for 6 months and then go spend the next 6 months lying on a beach in Florida if he wants to. But he isn't likely to own a big house or retire at 55. He had no problem at all though in getting 24 weeks vacation a year. He can make that choice. So can anyone else. The only difference is that one person sees it is a choice while another says, 'but I should be able to do both, I'm entitled'.

Let's try this offer for anyone who wants 5 weeks vacation or more. Take a job that pays you only commission. If you produce something you get paid, if you don't you starve. But, if you can produce enough in 6 months to pay you for 12 months, you will have 6 months vacation. Happy with that? Or do you want to be guaranteed 12 months income AND 5 weeks vacation, regardless of how well you produce? I think I know the answer to that one.

All I read in any negative comments about vacation time, nepotism, connections, etc. etc. is 'it ain't fair to me'. Well, that's true, it ain't fair and never will be. So what? What the individual does about that is what matters. You don't beat the system by complaining about it or running back to the UK with your tail between your legs at the first hurdle, you beat the system by being better at playing IN the system than others. The system isn't fair to anyone and you can be on one side or the other of 'fair'. The side no one wants to be on or the side everyone wants to be on but only some get to be on.

Canada will give you the opportunity to do whatever you want, but you have to figure out how to do that, not expect to be given it. In my 30s, I came to the realization that what I wanted was 52 weeks per year of vacation, not a piddly 5 weeks. So I sat down and figured out how to do that. And guess what, it was relatively easy. All I had to do was outproduce my peers. I've had 52 weeks vacation per year since my early 40s. I just figured out how to no longer need to work for a living while maintaining a decent income.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Why didn't you just say you don't believe in equal opportunities, it would have been quicker. ;)

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

What makes you think I don't believe in equal opportunity BristolUK? As for your document link, what does that indicate other than what might happen to one hypothetical person vs. another hypothetical person?

Where are the examples of real people? Where are all the immigrants to Canada who arrived with little or nothing and made a success of their life in Canada? https://www.google.ca/search?q=famou...hrome&ie=UTF-8

Try naming one successful person in Canada who is not an immigrant or the descendant of an immigrant. Everyone in Canada is from an immigrant family other than the native peoples.

I was an immigrant to Canada many years ago and I know that equal opportunity exists here for every immigrant. What I also know is that not everyone takes advantage of the opportunities that exist. My parents got off the boat with 2 little kids and less than $100 to start them out. Nothing was handed to them or to me, 'on a plate'.

What I see here BristolUK, is someone saying, 'hand me 5 weeks vacation on a plate.'

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

We get the basic mandatory 2 weeks where I work, although they give us 2 choices which is have it paid out each cheque or bank it and have 2 paid weeks off.

Typically the company is okay with taking vacation time provided there are not multiple employees wanting the same time frame off, and it's not peak summer season, no vacations permitted May to September or during December.

It's the airline industry so stat holidays don't really count as time off since the only way we get them off is if the holiday happens to fall on regular days off.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I think the minimum paid wage here is awful as is sick pay - for level entry and skilled worker (mechanics in dealerships) jobs. I get the legal minimum, paid out each paycheck (no choice). I work part time so I can figure in more vacation time and that's one reason I haven't sought a more fulfilling position.

My husband works at a Ford Dealership, he has now got to three weeks paid, it goes into a holiday pay fund which he can request at anytime whether he is on vacation or not, which I suppose is good. BUT he only get paid (and therefore holiday pay) if he is physically working on a vehicle, so he can be at work for 8 hours but if there is no work - through no fault of his own, there is no pay. Luckily enough for him in the dept he works in (on his own) he is busy 90% of the time. He can take unpaid vacation too.

We have family coming for three weeks, we have booked a total of 8 days off.

I have not met anyone who wouldn't like more paid vacation. Also unlike the UK if the Stat falls on a Saturday, you don't get an extra day on the Monday, which means fewer long weekends that year.

It takes getting used to, when we move across country, we want to be semi retired doing our own thing, something seasonal where we can control the hours, we have a few ideas how to make this happen.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I acknowledge your point that people working in Canada generally value something more than vacation but suggest that it is groceries and rent, or mortgage, paid, rather than anything open to ridicule. The essential difference between North America and Europe is that, in Europe, the working poor, and everyone above, can have a holiday, whereas workers in Canada are conditioned to think that time off work is wrong and so do not take even their begrudged allotment.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Cultural difference.

In North America two weeks paid holiday is standard - some give more - and the workplace cultural norm is that unpaid leave is seen as something to use for absolute emergencies when you run out of holiday time, not as a means of topping up your vacation.

OP also has to understand that Canadian employers are going to be reluctant to give the migrant coming in from the UK, more holiday time off, than the local employees.

Are the money and bigger house worth it, than the extra 3 weeks of holiday? People vote with their feet and you are in Canada . . .

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Your statement that you are not in favour of a level playing field.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

That may have been true 30+ years ago, sadly it is true no longer.

And being pedantic, you cannot "know" that this is true, you can only believe it to be true.,,

:)

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I am not sure equal opportunity has ever existed in the US/Canada.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Equal opportunity does exist in the US and Canada, and always has. But equal opportunity is different from equal outcomes.

It's not just a matter of people failing to take advantage. Lots of other things can happen too.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

OP, I am sorry I have just re-read your post.

Did you say that you moved to Canada without knowing that winter was long and cold, and summer was short?

Wow.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Do you read Canadian news much?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Really lolling!

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Again: Equal opportunity and equal outcomes are two entirely different things.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

But that doesn't mean that equal opportunity exists.

Or do you mean that an unequal outcome of, say, a job application was the process of unequal opportunity?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I don't follow your logic.

An unsuccessful job application is not evidence that someone is denied equal opportunity.

In a capitalist democracy, anyone can save up a little money, go into business, go into the stock market.

University entrance is virtually guaranteed to anyone who applies themselves in school and gets decent marks. There are tuition fees - but it is not back-breaking.

They can train to be in whatever profession they want, whether that is doctor or rubbish collector. Whether that training is successful or not is an outcome, not a denial of opportunity.

None of these things are possible in places like, say, Egypt or Vietnam. Even in some EU countries the possibility to re-enter university and re-train for a different profession at a later stage in life is a virtual impossibility.

Not everyone does this, for a variety of reasons, some of which is their fault, some not their fault, some the byproduct of decisions made earlier, some the byproduct of decisions to made to jiggle life priorities and not go that route.

All of which is fine.

To say that not everyone has an equal opportunity because not everyone has the same thing and not everyone is wealthy, is inaccurate.

Or to say someone is denied opportunity because an HR panel hires someone with a slightly worse CV because they got a recommendation from a reliable colleague that they knew - that is not "nepotism" but something sensible and used to be called a "reference check."

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

BristolUK, define how you perceive 'equal opportunity' for me.

My definition is the same as this one: What is equal opportunity? definition and meaning - BusinessDictionary.com

The last 6 words there are where we probably differ in our thinking of what it means.

"unrelated to ability, performance, and qualification."

I wrote I am not in favour of a level playing field, you are correct about that. I do not want everyone to have as much ability or be able to perform as well as I can. If they did, I would not have been able to outperform them and so gain more rewards than they did. It has nothing to do with equal opportunity. I have no problem with others having the same opportunity, I just want to do better than they do. What's wrong with that?

Carcajou is correct in saying equal opportunity exists but not equal outcomes. That is because we are NOT all equal in every way. If a job opening exists, we are all able to apply for it. The equal opportunity exists. But not all of us will get the job will we. The one who figures out how to get the employer to pick their resume out of 200 to make the short list for an interview and then figures out how to get picked from the 5 who are interviewed, is the one who will get the job. That happens to you when you are not the 'equal' of the others who are interviewed. It happens when you are superior in some way to the others.

I do think people really don't always understand what 'equal opportunity' refers to and carcajou is correct in suggesting that some think it equates to 'equal outcome'. But I also think that anyone of even average intelligence should be able to figure out they are not one and the same if you just think about it for a minute.

When I was one of 126 salespeople in a company and an opening came up for a Branch Manager's position, all 126 were free to throw their hat in the ring. But what do you think actually happened?

Some didn't even throw their hat in the ring because they didn't want the added responsibility and were happy as they were, earning a decent living and spending evenings and weekends with their family. They didn't want to have to leave on a Sunday night to fly to some city and then not return home until Friday night.

Some threw their hat in the ring because they were too dumb to realize that their mediocre performance levels meant they have no hope of being picked for the job. I have no doubt some of them later said 'they weren't treated equally'. It's amazing how many people can't actually see themselves as they are.

A few did have a chance based on their performance but for one reason or another, did not make the cut. Only ONE could make the cut obviously. That ONE had to be superior in some way. I was that one and later I was the one that became the National Sales Manager. In a way, some people seem to be suggesting that I didn't get there by being better, I got there because the contest wasn't equal. Are you kidding me?

As carcajou wrote, "for a variety of reasons, some of which is their fault, some not their fault," and I agree with that but I also think we need to be realistic and tell it like it is. If someone's performance is mediocre and they are doing the best they can do, they won't get the job even though it isn't their fault, they're doing the best they can, but someone else is able to do better. The opportunity was equal, the outcome will never be equal.

Life is not fair we hear people often saying but it's always about it not being fair to them. We live in the real world, so we have to deal with that world as it is. I knew a company President who passed over a perfectly competent and qualified candidate for a management position because the guy tended to wear sports jackets and slacks rather than suits. That isn't about being treated 'unequally', that is about being too dumb to notice that every manager wears a suit every day in that company. Have you heard the saying, 'dress for the job you want, not the job you have.'
Should you still 'dress for the job you want'? | Fortune.com

The guy who was doing his best but didn't get the job because someone was better, has no reason to beat himself up about that. We all have our limits. But the guy who didn't get the promotion because he dressed too casually should have realized that and does have a reason to beat himself up a bit. Hopefully, he learns for the next time if he ever finds out why he didn't get the job. Something by the way that is hard to find out.

I once worked with a company who for the second interview would invite the candidate to lunch. They watched his table manners and comfort level in a higher end restaurant as well as how many drinks they could push and get him to accept. It indicated to them how they could expect the candidate to perform when out with a customer. And in case anyone is wondering, one drink, that's it. If the person wasn't comfortable in the setting or didn't know how to graciously turn down a second drink, that was enough to eliminate them, regardless of their qualifications in any other way and yes, someone less qualified could end up getting the job because they were perfectly comfortable in the situation. That's what they were better at.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Who said it was? You've never heard of postcode discrimination? Name discrimination? People being favoured on the grounds of what school they went to? First nations background?
Factors that get people discounted very early even though they meet the qualification/experience requirements.
And never in my life have I heard anyone suggest that. I've not said it, yet you appear to think I have. Or you have jumped to that conclusion because you can't or won't believe discrimination exists and that there are innocent, logical reasons for outcomes.
A reference check is one thing but the expression "jobs for the boys" came about for very obvious reasons. :nod:

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

It seems a fair definition but either I misunderstand what you say or you misunderstand its meaning.


Those various distinctions or differences are separate to the unrelated differences of ability, performance, and qualification, because those are differences that are acceptable to be used.

That definition isn't saying that everyone should have the same ability. It's saying that they shouldn't be excluded from opportunities before one gets to ability, performance, and qualification.

Of course not.
The equal opportunity to apply exists. But that's not the same as an equal opportunity for equally qualified to be offered that job.

Are you seriously saying that women will always get the same opportunity as men? Or that Mohamed is just as likely to make the short list as Brian? Or that the company whose board consists of Harvard and Yale educated people won't want others from similar Unis in preference to the less well know ones, even though their degrees are the same?

I can agree that not all apparent 'discrepancies' of outcomes are down to discrimination.

One that crops up regularly is the lack of black football managers/coaches in the UK. "Racist football" some people say and, of course, there is some. But contrasting the proportion of black players currently playing with the lack of black managers/coaches is too simplistic.

It disregards the fact that almost exclusively managers and coaches are former professional players and it's only in the last decade or so that there's been a significant increase in the number of black players in the game.

One assumes that, in time, the increasing percentage of retiring footballers that are black will lead to more black managers/coaches.

Incidentally, a level playing field...
From wiki
The better team will usually win on a level playing field. In days gone by, in football's FA Cup we used to see upsets when small clubs, playing at home, beat bigger clubs. That was usually because the poor state of the playing surface was considered a "leveller" meaning it hampered the better team who needed the better surface for their more technical style.

A non level playing field helped the lesser players whereas the better players excelled on a level playing field.

If the playing field is level, then everyone plays by the same rules and no external interference affects the ability of the players to compete fairly with the likely outcome that the better ones succeed.

Are you sure you don't want a level playing field? If you are better than the competition, the level playing field will allow you to show that ;)

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Well for starters, I am not interested in any comments that refer to the UK. This is not the UK, this is Canada.

Equal opportunity exists for every immigrant who arrives here. What they make out of those opportunities is up to them.

Discrimination does of course exist but it is not prevalent in this country and not all discrimination that is not racial, ethnic, etc. is necessarily a terrible thing.

We all discriminate every day in various ways. Discriminate basically means differentiate. It does not just refer to race, religion, etc. If I want to hire only Harvard grads, why shouldn't I be able to do so? A degree from Podunk University is not the same as a degree from Harvard. No one thinks it is except the person from PU who didn't get the job because s/he wasn't able to convince the employer that s/he was a better fit for the job than a Harvard grad was and cries discrimination as an excuse for not getting the job. Simple as that.

I once was interviewed by a company for a sales position who only hired Engineering grads for 'Sales Technician' positions. No person had ever been hired for that position who was not a P. Eng. I was not an Engineer, I wasn't even a university grad. I got the job. How did that happen? How did their history of 'discrimination' against non-engineers get overcome?

The only reason I even got the interview was because the head hunter the company used and trusted, urged them to interview me. An example of carcajou's comment re a reference overcoming a qualification. As part of the interview, I was asked to do a Mechanical Aptitude test. No doubt as a way to eliminate me and still say to their head hunter that they had given me a shot. Was I being asked to play on a level playing field? Hell no, I was most definitely being asked to play uphill against the competition.
How to prepare for your mechanical aptitude test or mechanical reasoning test

After the test, the interviewer told me that they had never hired a non-engineering grad. He was upfront about it because he also admitted that I had scored better on the test than most of the engineers in the company had. When I pressed him a bit, he admitted I had a perfect score. So he had a problem. Here I was with a perfect score in a test he expected to eliminate me, but I was not an engineer. What to do?

Salesmen solve problems. That's all sales is. So I told him that I had spent the last 10 years studying selling and I asked him how many years an engineer spent studying selling. Then I asked him if they wanted to hire someone to engineer something or to sell something?

Now here's the kicker. He said to hell with it and hired me. He was the National Sales Manager and had the authority to do so. But a week after I started, I was invited out to lunch by the President who told me that if he had been in town (he was away at some conference somewhere), I would have had to also be interviewed by him. He made a practice of interviewing all Engineers before they were hired. He told me he would never have agreed to my being hired. He flat out told me that.

My response was, 'Lawton (we use first names for everyone here in Canada, eh), if you are ever disappointed in my performance all you have to do is ask me to leave and I'll be gone at the end of that day without any fuss. All I ask is that you give me 3 months to prove what I can do.' He just nodded his head. That was my interview with him.

I will admit that I was pretty nervous when it got near to the end of those first 3 months. He never mentioned it again in the 7 years I worked with him and in fact when I did eventually tell him I planned to move on, he asked me for a year's notice. I was the National Sales Manager by that time.

I don't want a level playing field BristolUK, I want to be on the uphill side playing with the advantage but if I end up on the downhill side, I'll play uphill if I have to and I will expect to win.

For every example you can find of someone who lost out based on some kind of discrimination, there is an example of someone who won regardless of any kind of discrimination that had to be overcome. Canada is full of people who arrived as immigrants and became successful Canadians but I doubt that any of them ever complained about not getting 5 weeks vacation.

I am the son of a coal miner and my two sons are both in top management in the financial sector of business today. That's what Canada offers any immigrant.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

FFS are you a total prat or just stupid enough to think that all that shit matters. Do you have any respect for yourself at all?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Well Novocastrian, the proof is in the pudding as they say. So other than calling me a prat and stupid, do you care to put up your accomplishments against mine to show the readers how you know better than I do what matters?

I came to Canada as an immigrant and retired in my early 40s. How are you doing Novocastrian?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

:confused:
The level playing field, team games, slopes....don't they have team games on such surfaces in Canada then? Strewth. :rolleyes:

I gave UK examples of the idea because being British they're more easily recognised especially by Brits.

That aside, there's still the issue of you misunderstanding that part of the definition that you agree with that separates "ability, performance, and qualification" from the other factors rather than including it.

Oh well...

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

You really don't want me to answer that baby.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Sure I do Novocastrian, just don't lie.

I really can't be bothered with people who have to resort to personal insults when they are incapable of mounting a rebuttal of something. And I really can't be bothered with playing the 'parent, adult, child' model of Transactional Analysis. So if you want to argue a point, go ahead and argue it as an adult.

Sorry BristolUK, if I am missing your point re the 'ability, performance and qualification'. Equal opportunity does not include those according to the definition I linked. It is all before that which is included. Is that how you understand it?

Ability, performance and qualification differ by individual and so anyone who is eliminated as say a job candidate because of those has not been deprived of equal opportunity. Are we in agreement on that?

As for my comment re not being interested in comments referring to the UK, I simply meant, I prefer to use Canadian examples. Level playing field is equally as common a term here with no shortage of sport examples such as baseball or hockey. When in Rome, do as the Romans do. You're in Canada right?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Oh FFS, just ask around.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

According to your post here

You emigrated as a small child, were educated in Canada (presumably) and became 'as if Canadian'.. you didn't emigrate as an adult with previous work experience in another country and try to find an 'equal opportunity' in Canada. Sorry, whilst I admire your tenacity in obtaining a position that needed you to push the boundaries, comparing yourself to someone who has come over as an adult, educated overseas and with overseas work experience isn't really cutting it.

:)

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I'll give your comments the attention they are obviously worth Novocastrian.

Can anyone tell me if there an ignore function in this forum?

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

It's really not how I understand it, it's how it is.
...opportunities...should be freely available to all citizens irrespective of their age, race, sex, religion, political association, ethnic origin, or any other individual or group characteristic unrelated to ability, performance, and qualification.

It means you can relate/restrict or limit the opportunity according to ability, performance, and qualification. Don't limit according to perceived characteristic, just to the opportunity-specific needs.

Yes, if it really is that reason. But the other issues I mentioned are researched and documented.

I have pretty much zero interest in North American sports but I know enough that hockey over here is what we would call ice hockey and I'm pretty sure there are no sloping ice rinks and that there's no change of ends in baseball. :rofl:
(sorry, couldn't resist)

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I would call the tuition fees back breaking unless wealthy. Low income full-time workers can't exactly go to school and pay the tuition so yes it can and is back breaking and prevents people from attending college or gaining further skills.

This little tid bit in student aid eligibility (for BC anyhow) is one hurdle working adults face when they can't afford tuition out of pocket.

"be pursuing full-time studies as your primary occupation"

So yes, tuition and associated costs with higher education is back breaking for a great deal of people.

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

I understand what you are saying Souixie but I fail to see what it has to do with equal opportunity. If you applied for the same job as I did, I would get the job since I am a Canadian, is that what you are saying? That you would be at a disadvantage? If so, I agree that's probably true.

The opportunity is equal for both of us but your qualifications will not equal mine. Qualifications however have nothing to do with an equal opportunity. That seems to be the point that some people just don't get. You don't get to come to Canada and be my equal, you just aren't my equal in experience or qualifications in CANADIAN terms and you ARE in Canada. So I have an advantage at least initially, that's just the way it is but it has nothing to do with an equal opportunity to apply for that job.

Let's try the shoe on the other foot. If I moved tomorrow to the UK, how would I fare in getting a sales job compared to experienced UK salespeople? Would I be at a disadvantage? Or would I have an advantage? I'm guessing (because I want to show you how you such a belief could be wrong) that you will say I would be at a disadvantage.

In fact, I moved 'back' to the UK some years ago for a short period of time. It was after I had retired and came about because I met and married my now wife. She needed to put in a couple of more years before she could take early retirement, so we lived in the UK for that period of time.

To fill in some time, I took a part time job designing and selling decking for back gardens. Why didn't a Brit get that job? I had no UK sales experience after all. At that time, decks were still a comparatively new thing in the UK. I happened to see a guy loading deck boarding into a trailer at a building supply outlet where I was looking to buy some decking to build my own deck onto our new house. I got talking to the guy and asked him why it was that everyone in the UK seemed to lay decking upside down?

He asked what I meant and I explained that decking in N. America is all smooth and that the grooves that the mills in Norway cut in the pressure treated lumber they send to the UK for use in decking, were stress relief grooves. They are intended to keep the board from warping into a curve as it naturally wants to do because of the tree rings. They go on the underside. The belief that they are intended to be on the top side is still a common belief in the UK today. People step off a decked dock onto the wooden deck of a sailboat and never wonder why the sailboat has smooth decks (teak on the more expensive boats) and yet the dock had grooves in the boards. See a conundrum in that comparison? A bare foot on a smooth teak deck will have more grip than a bare foot on a grooved deck, it's as simple as understanding the word friction.

He asked what I was doing in the UK and I explained I was retired and living there because of my recent marriage. He owned the decking company and offered me a job on the spot. I wasn't at a disadvantage compared to UK sales people, I had an advantage. I was more qualified than they were in my knowledge of decking and at least equal in my sales experience. I built my first deck with my Father when I was 15 or so and quite a few since then. What's more it turned out I actually had a secret weapon as well, my accent. When I would go to a prospective customer's house to talk to them about a deck, I had immediate credibility since they generally knew that decks were a N. American idea and so that's where the expertise came from, as did I.

Like I said, I don't want to play on a level playing field, I prefer having the advantage and that even exists sometimes when you didn't even know you had it. LOL

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

There are many opportunities and funding options for some groups. Largely many folks don't know how and where to find the.

https://www.canada.ca/en/services/be...education.html
http://www.bowmanemployment.com/jobseekers
Self-Employment Program (SEP) for PPMB & PWD - Province of British Columbia
Single Parent Employment Initiative - Province of British Columbia
https://www.workbc.ca/Training-Education.aspx

Re: Canada's vacation politics
 

Because you keep saying you are an immigrant - but whilst you are technically an immigrant (as are the majority of the people who live in North America) in reality you are a Canadian and have been since you were a child.

I don't think you can grasp that there is a difference between an immigrant who has grown up in Canada from a very early age and an immigrant who has come over as an adult.

Your 'mindset' is as a Canadian, not as an immigrant, your responses clearly reflect that.

There are many people who are discriminated against due to their ethnicity, education, what school they went to and the like - even when they are equally as qualified and capable of doing a job. As someone posted upthread, nepotism is rife in Canada "it's not what you know, it's who you know'... something you don't seem to have a problem with - perhaps because you have been in Canada since an early age.

:)