I've had lead/architect roles tossed my way that pay 180k+ CAD which is more than I'm making but I'm not quite ready to move yet. I lead a small, smart dev team and enjoy my role.

Vancouver's real estate bubble is spilling over and lots of people are being priced out here, too. Especially given the tech community is smaller so most people work for the provincial government, trades etc.

Tentatively planning to move back next year or maybe the year after.

May I contact you for some advice? (There is no public email in your HN profile so I'm asking here in a comment)

Most data scientists I know make 90k-150k if they work for a local company. The most successful I know make about 400k.

That does seem a bit high for data science positions, which IMO are relatively underpaid compared to data engineers or engineers. But also, IMO, most data science programmes produce vastly under-qualified data scientists, so maybe it's proportional / fair. I don't know.

From what I have seen outside of the tech industry the wage scale is very similar to Portland Oregon, but without the benefit of the significantly cheaper housing in Portland. Skiing is really close by tho :)

I could already ski, after ~5 hours of lessons (group lessons in 2 chunks) I was fine for red runs and such.

Saving money on 70k/yr is really hard, and even at 135-140k/yr it makes most sense to find a roommate and share an apartment, which is a bit ridiculous. I find living downtown without a car to be simpler and probably a bit cheaper, even, than living farther from the train lines and having a car.

I don't know how people with "normal" salaries make it in Vancouver. It seems to me that the degree of living standard sacrifices most people must make is absurd, especially considering how much cheaper the rest of the country is.

The reason $2/litre gas is so bad here is because commuting by car is so common for the working Canadian. Canadians average over 15000km per year.

I think it's a combination of our geography as well as our US-like obsession with low tax rates preventing us from investing in rail etc.

Outside few big cities yes, not for the mean mileage of USA (and Canada?) suburbs, but range from 60-120km/day (37-75 miles) round-trip total are fairly common, public transports outside big and mean city do exists but it's not much used nor have a significant cover, it's almost limited to service schools and few elderly or tourism in specific areas.

Rails in the past was significantly developed but nowadays are developed only between few areas for expensive high-speed trains or commercial freight. See http://carfree.fr/img/2015/06/sncf.jpg just as "big picture" example. Even hi-speed trains (like TGV) lower their speed because rails upkeep for real hi-speed is too costly...

Roads on contrary, with a certain variability, tend to be well maintained and designed well enough to commute at human speed and many have more than one car, most still live outside cities (in the sense of European dense cities) to have individual homes.

Salaries vary but I think they are close respect of overall cost of living to Canada... Indeed the Gilet Jaunes movement born against the first round of gas price hikes few years ago (just taxes), and now even if covid + Ukrainian war have MUCH silenced anything protests step up again essential for the same inflationary/economical reasons.

Protests in Spain despite those factors. <https://www.thelocal.es/20220320/thousands-protest-over-soar...>

In Canada, Real estate agent/brokerage profession has topped other lucrative career options like Software Enginner, Doctor, Lawyer.

In last year, they have dominated the country in overall worth. They will likely call the shots in coming years.

If you want to see a demo, check advertisements banner put on your local transit vehicles like TTC, Yum, YRT etc.

People are leaving their day jobs to work as REA.