Canadian working conditions? (Was: Trying to flee the country)

["Hart, Geoff" <Geoff-H -at- MTL -dot- FERIC -dot- CA>]

Missed the original statement, but someone perpetrated the phrase <<Canada
is a great place to work.... if you don't mind the 62.5% income tax rate and
another 15% tax on anything you buy.  Can you believe the tax on alcohol is
80%? Now that's just nasty!>>

While I'll admit that the combined federal and provincial sales tax in
pseudo-medieval antimeritocratic dictatorships such as Quebec (where I live)
actually reaches 15%, the rest of this tax information is way out of whack.
I'm being taxed in the ca. 35% range, which could be considered to reach 50%
if you add in the sales tax. That's nasty. But Quebec is the highest-taxed
province in all of Canada, and some jurisdictions lack income tax or
provincial sales tax, just like in the U.S. And even in Quebec, I live very
comfortably, thank you very much, without even having gone in search of a
better-paying job (which I've been offered several times).

Bringing this comment back on target for techwhirlers, the answer to whether
you'll make more money in Canada or the U.S. is "it depends". Every few
years, one of our financial magazines does a comparison of living costs in
Canada and the U.S., and the results always turn out to depend on where you
live, your family situation, your health, who you're working for, and what
you're doing there. Canadian health insurance costs can by themselves make a
huge difference in standards of living, and world-class universities (e.g.,
my alma mater, University of Toronto) often cost much less per year than
low-grade state colleges. Not to mention cleaner air and water, lower crime
rates, and up until recently, better hockey teams <g>.

--Geoff Hart, FERIC, Pointe-Claire, Quebec
geoff-h -at- mtl -dot- feric -dot- ca

"Technical writing... requires understanding the audience, understanding
what activities the user wants to accomplish, and translating the often
idiosyncratic and unplanned design into something that appears to make
sense."--Donald Norman, The Invisible Computer