The second compensation and welfare

I wish you all a happy New Year. We do not have a holiday, I have to please the 15th and 16th two days, namely New Year’s Eve and the first day of the rest. Fortunately, 19th is an official family day, so I asked for 2 days instead of 5 days off. In addition to celebrating the New Year, I also have a piece of good news, that is, I succeeded in job-hopping and now work as Android Leader again. I hope I can continue to make good progress in the New Year. Let’s start with the introduction of compensation and benefits in Canada.

1. Salary

In fact, my wife and I have just come to Canada for 2 years, and we don’t work in many companies. If we want to talk about salary, we may not have enough samples. So the data here, is to say, and there is no industry authority data said.

Take a look at some screenshots from www.indeed.ca, one of the Canadian job search sites

Here are Indeed’s own statistics.

In addition, GlassDoor also has some salary data, which I’ve looked at during my job search.

Here’s the data from Indeed. Here are my impressions from my work experience with my wife.

• Budding programmers: We have sophomores here. The guy was 18, frighteningly young, in his second year at Waterloo (Waterloo has a great computer science department, and the Google branch is in Waterloo). I guess he is also of Chinese descent because he has a Chinese surname and lives in the Chinese area but does not speak Chinese), I guess the salary is not too high but not too low. It must be higher than the minimum wage in Toronto (the minimum wage is 14 Canadian dollars per hour in 2018, so the minimum wage is about 30,000 dollars per year).
• Intermediate programmer: This piece, depending on your strength, I think it should be around 60K to 80K.
• Senior programmer: This is not China. I read a news app the day before yesterday, and I had to hire 600,000 people. Of course, this 600 thousand RMB is very good in China, but there is no such level in Canada. My personal feeling is that there is a ceiling around CAD $120K for advanced programmers, and it seems quite difficult to go beyond that. This is mainly determined by the overall industry environment.

Toronto doesn’t have big players like Apple, Microsoft or Google, and mobile development doesn’t have as many innovative ideas as In China, so there’s no job-hopping and no strong hiring demand, which makes the whole industry’s wages not as hot as in China. And we’ll talk about the year-end bonus as well.

As a Chinese, it is easy to talk about the annual salary of hundreds of K. Every time HR has a conversation with me, I want to say 200K (for example), not just blurt out 200K. Ll: Well, in Canada, when you say 552,000, you don’t say five hundred and fifty two thousand. So many people say “five fifty two K”, which means “fifty-two K”.

2. Job benefits

Working welfare can be said to be a very different place between China and Canada. When I first arrived, I felt the impact was not small.

• Annual leave: When I used to work AT a home in BAT, it seemed to start with 7 days annual leave, with one extra day per year, no more than 15 or 20 days AT most. That day is basically a 10-day start. For example, in a big company, I was given 4 weeks’ annual leave, that is, 20 days’ annual leave. Twenty days surprised me, I worked for 12 months, and almost had one month off. I’m happy with that part.

• Health related benefits: In Canada, the doctor is free, the medicine is free. After prescribing the prescription, you need to pay the labor cost ($11.99 per time in 2017) to the pharmacy. But note that this is the general health category, which excludes dentists and eye surgeons. So you can understand why dentists make so much money on TV. So as a business, the way to have health related benefits, of course, is to have insurance for things like the dentist, so you don’t have to go to the dentist and bleed out your wallet. The other benefits are critical illness insurance, accident insurance, things like that.

  • The enterprise health welfare is the enterprise to pay most, the individual to pay a small part, than to buy commercial insurance to get much better.
  • In addition, employees can choose which benefits to participate in and which procedures to participate in (each benefit basically has a low, medium and high level, such as how many thousand yuan of compensation for critical illness).
  • Employees can also include their own families. That way benefits can be extended to the whole family.
  • Remarks: because the doctor does not want money, so I heard that the service is general, the time is slow. I’ve heard of people who had heart attacks and had to wait months for surgery. And this guy flew back to China for surgery.

• Commuting time

  • This one surprised me, too. I didn’t go to a bank to do business. It was only 2:40, and someone came off work. The front desk said to the person, “See you Monday. It might have something to do with the kids, because the school charges you if you don’t pick them up after school. So I’m guessing these guys are probably picking up their kids. There’s a lot more people on the subway at 3:00 or 4:00. So I guess a lot of people can leave early.
  • Telecommuting: There may be a contractor or a remote employee. Therefore, some companies allow working from home. Especially when I drive to work every Friday, I always find that there are fewer cars on the road on Friday. I guess some people also work from home, so that they can stay at home for three days, including Saturday and Sunday.

• Overtime: this is also what we care about. Innovation in China is fast, and competition in the industry is intense. For example, a chicken eating mobile tour, big companies want to be the first out, earn more traffic. So it’s inevitable to work overtime to get it out earlier than everyone else. In addition, leaders are under a lot of pressure and there are not many good means to show that we are working hard, so overtime is becoming more common. As an individual, I certainly don’t like working overtime. I think even leaders want to spend evenings and weekends with their families, but all kinds of pressure have created the overtime culture in China. Canada, on the other hand, has less competition, less pay and less overtime. I have never seen overtime work before. Not long ago, our project was tight, so we worked overtime for more than a month. If you don’t take time off, it will be converted to time and a half when it expires. Of course, the government should deduct a lot of taxes from overtime pay, but it’s still more. In a word, I am happy because I get money from working overtime. (Note: when the company conducts internal questionnaire survey, or when leaders have one-to-one chat with subordinates, they will ask about work life balance and whether you are satisfied with the current working intensity. Canada should pay attention to this area.)

• Year-end bonus: in fact, part of the above mentioned, after leaving China, I have reflected on myself, I feel that China has a lot of overtime, but also a lot of year-end bonus. After arriving in Canada, there was little overtime and little annual bonus. This is similar to the annual bonus in China, which is actually your overtime pay if the company is doing well. I read an article before that the average year-end bonus in the Bay Area of the United States is only 2 months. The Canadian side is similar. Last year I got the highest level of performance in the company, and my annual bonus was two months ‘pay. The average performer, I’m afraid, got even less.

• Training and growth: Google I/O conferences, Apple conferences, or Android tech sharing conferences in Washington, D.C. or wherever, our company pays for us to go. Package air tickets, package accommodation, reimburse when you come back. However, my nationality is still Chinese, so I need a visa to go to the United States (Canadians can go to the United States without a visa, it seems). Besides, I didn’t pass the Google I/O lottery, so I didn’t go, so I felt a little pity, so I had to console myself with sour grapes, “Google I/O is a 3-day open-air conference, It’s hot in California. “Google I/O is here again. But I am job-hopping period, no one reimbursement, afraid is still can not go.

• Salary increase and promotion: I feel that Canada is far behind some Chinese enterprises in this area. In the company I once worked for, in addition to recruitment, HR is busy preparing for promotion qualification and salary increase at the end of the year. We, as supervisors, are also busy recommending promotion lists and helping subordinates prepare for promotion defense. In short, employees can see their growth, which helps us retain excellent employees. But on this side of the border, at least at the companies I’ve worked for (still big companies, worth tens of billions of dollars), annual raises are minimal and promotion opportunities are virtually nonexistent. When the performance evaluation was finished at the end of the year, I got the top 20%, but when the supervisor talked with you, he directly said that you had performed well this year. Congratulations, how much year-end bonus did you get (about 2 months ‘salary), and your salary increase was XXX yuan (super small, this salary increase is for the annual salary, which is even less evenly spread to each month). No, your manager won’t even give you time to ask questions or tell you if you’re up for a promotion. I admit that the meagre raise and lack of channels for advancement contributed to my departure. But in general, my sample is too small, only one company, I hope other companies in Canada have regular promotion channels and reasonable salary increases.

Cost of living

When I visited Canada in 2012, I found that a large box of juice cost only 3 dollars, and a family pack of Lay’s potato chips cost only 2 or 3 dollars. At that time, I felt that it was very easy to live under the pressure of making money and buying things here.

I was only half right. When I actually moved to Canada in 2016, I found some of their things were expensive. One is renting a house. Generally, a family’s annual income of 100,000 RMB is not bad (maybe only 70,000 RMB after tax), but our rent, rent and parking space cost nearly 2,000 RMB a month, which is much more difficult than in China. It’s like if you make 20,000 or 30,000 yuan after tax in China, but you need 10,000 yuan for rent. Feel it. But the location I rent is better, and there’s a pool gym, so it might be a little more expensive. But in general, renting is better than buying in Canada. The second expensive thing is labor. Repair what things are dozens of dollars an hour, for example, when we buy a house, find a professional inspector to help us check the house where there is a problem, less than 2 hours, 300 dollars.

Other things are cheaper, especially I found made in China everywhere in Canada. These things don’t cost much, but to be honest, they are more expensive than in China. So I think about Jack Ma every day to open Taobao to Canada. The biggest online shopping in our country is Amazon, but you wouldn’t believe it. Several times I bought something on Amazon, but it took me two months to send it to you by ordinary express delivery. I’m not exaggerating, it’s 2 months. Amazon also has a faster delivery service, Amazon Prime, but you have to buy it for $79 a year.

After I came here, I didn’t feel so distressed to buy some things. For example, Sony WH1000XM2 noise-cancelling headphones cost $500, Philips Sonic toothbrush cost $200, or Nintendo Switch cost $400. Although it is not cheap, it may be that the number is reduced, but it is not so painful. Can’t do it.)

Plus, this house shouldn’t be too stressful. For example, I just bought a house, which I could not afford in the city center, so I went farther to buy it (equivalent to buying yuhang in Hangzhou), with a total price of more than 500,000 DOLLARS. With a 25-year loan and housing insurance, I only need to pay about 2,100 dollars a month, which is similar to my rent. So I’d rather contribute to a house than rent it. House plus basement three stories, front and back two yards, can give the wife a place to grow meat. I’m happy with the apartment, but it’s far from work and takes a lot of commuting time.

4. To summarize

The work is less stressful and more work-life balanced, but considering the cost of living, senior programmers actually get more money (and more stress) in China.

In the next one, maybe something about English learning, or foreign team culture, or interview. I haven’t decided yet, so stay tuned.

This series of portals

Interesting Canadian Programmer Stories series 1/N: Job opportunities

Canadian Programmer Anecdote Series 2/N: Compensation and Benefits

Interesting Canadian Programmer Series 3/N: Life

Interesting Canadian Programmer Series 4/N: Teams