U.S. tech workers are increasingly choosing to work in Canada, according to a new study by tech hub MaRS. In 2017, tech companies in Toronto saw a large increase in U.S. applicants.
MaRS surveyed 55 tech companies in the province and discovered more than 50 percent had an increase in international applications, reported Axios. Of these applicants, 82 percent were from the United States. Some companies saw double or even triple the number of U.S. applicants.
Of those who were actually hired, about 55 percent were from the United States. They were largely engineers (47 percent), data scientists (24 percent), and researchers (10 percent).
The results match a study MaRS conducted last year in which Toronto-based startups reported that U.S. job seekers had a newfound interest in their companies.
Canada, France and other countries have been working to attract tech workers from the United States and other parts of the world. The increased number of U.S. applications may be due to President Trump’s policy towards immigration. It’s believed his stance has sparked American interest in Canadian employment.
In addition, Toronto and Vancouver are turning into tech hubs, which are drawing top talent from the international market. In 2017, Business Insider ranked these two cities among the top 25 high-tech municipalities in the world.
“The best global tech talent wants to be where they anticipate the best global tech to be emerging. And you’re also seeing indications that that might not be in the States right now,” said Karen Greve Young, vice president of partnerships at MaRS, in summer 2017.
When asked why Americans were applying for Canadian jobs, 61 percent of the companies pointed to the Global Skills Strategy Visa, which grants work visas in 10 days to two weeks for “low-risk, high skills talent.”
“It’s about expediting this process for employers, so rather than the lengthy labour market impact assessment that people had to go through before, now there’s this fast track where we’ll be able to work with employers on applications, and they’ll be responsible for demonstrating through a plan how it will benefit Canadians,” said Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development Navdeep Bains and Minister of Employment, Workforce Development and Labour Patty Hajdu explained last year.
