Most has already been said before, so I won't harp on, but just consider the differences between "cost of living", "standard of living" and "quality of life", then as others say, research and decide what you want for you and yours.

-35% ! I'd tell them to stick it.
Ontario is NOT cheap.
Are they paying for your move?

You will need money to fund this "Lifestyle" END OF !!

Majj

$56K seems pretty low to live in an urban area. Ask yourself would you work for ₤28k in say near London?
I would ask myself if the job in Canada is lower paid than its equivalent in the UK. Are you being low balled? Look at Monster board in Canada and UK to get comparisons in your area of work. It not uncommon practice to offer lower salaries to immigrants. I have experienced this myself and a couple of times had argued with the HR department because the salaries being offered to immigrant candidate engineers were $10-$15k lower.

These are cost for a family of 2.2 in Ontario to give you some cost

http://www40.statcan.ca/l01/cst01/famil16d.htm

I lived in rural Ontario for 6 years and been back living in Oxfordshire for a year now.
I have been tracking our costs since we returned and found that we spend less in the UK than in Canada on general living expensive, but cost more for leisure i.e eating out, bowling, swimming etc.
We only do a less than third of the annual mileage now. We are finding our heating & electricity, food, car running costs, car & home insurance, property taxes are lower.
But our rent now is nearly double our Canadian mortgage (which was more than we had when we left the UK in 1997).
Fast food, hotels, leisure activities, toys, DIY tools etc and some lower quality goods are cheaper in Canada.
As previous said petrol is half UK price, but it is not uncommon to double your annual mileage in less efficient vehicles.
We drive a diesel car now as well so we actually spend half on travel compared to when we were in Canada.

I hired 4 engineers from the UK from 2002-04, aged 30-37 years old. UK salaries were 34-39k in pounds we paid them 70-80k in dollars if that helps you.

I would look at where you plan to live in Ontario at housing costs, property taxes, heating/electricity bill, car insurance etc to make an assessment if the move worth it.

hudd

We (family of five) started on $55K (CDN) THIRTEEN years ago in Calgary! It was 'ok' then, but not great - and at that time, Calgary WAS considerably cheaper to live than Toronto.

Edit to add - just did some checking; it was about a 45% cut for us. Hadn't given it much thought, til now......

I would have to go back nearly 8 years last time I was earning £27/28k.

I can relate to £34-39k in 2002 to 2004 and similarily would expect something closer to $C80k. The offer has been increased, but I still don't think it is worth it.

Its a crazy idea, but tell em! They have a lot of time and expense invested in finding you. If they could find someone local , they probably would have. Tell them what it will take to get you there, give them good reasons why their current offer is not attractive enough (either cos you are worth $X to their business, or cos you have done your research into the cost of living and its not enough to get you ahead of where you are now)

Be nice about it, and you might be surprised how little they want to go through the hassle of finding another candidate when they have already decided on you.

Really, this is the only time in employer/ employee negotiations when you have the upper hand. Right now they want you, and you dont really want them for what they are offering.

You need to be nice and intelegent about it though, and give them good reasons why its not enough. If they move, great, if not, well, it wasnt enough money anyway, so nothing lost.

I agree with iaink - if you've no intention of taking the offer in it's present form - then push them! You've nothing to lose, and everything to gain.

I agree you are right to expect C$80K if you believe thats appropiate pay for you level of expertise and experience.
When I was hiring in 2002-2004 I was paying 46-50k for graduate engineer, $65-70k for 5-10 years experience, engineer(15 years+ $78K-$85k). Senior Engineer with more than 20 years experience $90-$95K.

I came back to the UK with 18 years experience in plant operations and management and got base salary of £53k. Plant managers in Ontario would expect to make double that in dollars.

We live in Peterborough (north-east of Toronto). My hubby is a Software Engineer, he earns C$101000 a year. I am a housewife (we have 2 kids), so that is our only income. We only have 1 car and as 15 year old house ($1000 a month payment on house). We think if we must move to the GTA, $101000 will not be enough for us to have the same life as we had at the moment in Peterborough.

I just came back from a few weeks in Canada where I spoke with a few friends on this.

One friend gets just over $100k he told me that there are many people in the company doing exactly what he's doing for a lot less money.

He told me it's about what you think your worth with his company. You have to be willing to sell yourself. Just don't sell yourself short.

With his first job he just took what was offered and once he realised he was being underpaid he moved on. (He just used it as a way in)

Good point. There's a couple of factors to be considered.

1) The days of employer/employee loyalty are long gone so don't expect a job for life with the same employer.

2) If you are any good at your job and your employer values your work then any wage deficiencies should soon be resolved because they will know that you're likely to move on.

3) Look at the first job as simply getting on the job ladder. Don't expect an equivalent position to your UK job immediately until you prove yourself.

No, they are not paying for the move.

55k 13 years ago! I was offered that last year in Calgary. I politely declined.

Very wise!