Close Reading

I live in a medium size city in Canada I’m not gonna say the name of it, but it has in between 100,000 and 400,000 people but where I live it seems to be 30% Indian immigrants and I am not racist one bit but it it seems to be more immigrants, then are actual people that lived here before and it just seems to be like the city. I’m living is changing so fast. And it seems like it’s doubling every year I think it’s projected to be a million people by 2050 and less the 300 thousand people live here so

TFW here, east Asian, a couple of things:\nI am paid the provincial minimum wage, and work in the dairy industry, medium sized farm.\nI started working straight out of high school\n\nFrom what I can see and hear from across the province and largely in the western Canadian provinces, older generation farmers are at the retirement age, but the younger generation is generally very reluctant to take over. \nNot all industries, but definitely in livestock, people sometimes don't realize that, there is literally no breaks, ever! You work every day, holidays, Christmas, and if you do chose to take a few days off, your co-workers, i.e. other family members or workers, have to take up the extra workload. You barely have time for your family, you are often tired around your kids. Farmers have some of the highest suicide rates among all occupations, as well as a difficulty to find partners due to the nature of their jobs.\nThe work is hard, days long, especially during harvests, and if the ever more expensive tractors, equipment fail...\nThere used to be a lot of family owned farms, over the last few decades most have sold their generational farm and left the industry, most because of the cost to operate and because the next generation's unwillingness to take over.\nYong people my age have not been seen applying for my position in a few years now, despite ongoing hiring effort at significantly higher than minimum wage, and I have repeatedly stated that I, although love my job, am ready to step aside at any point so a Canadian PR or citizen can take my position, as required by worker rules. There were a few inquiries from neighboring areas, mostly made by parents, but their children in the end all refused to work, even part time, or seasonal.\n\nOn the other hand, there is the issue of prices: equipment costs have largely more than doubled since the pandemic, grain prices rose... and all that on top of the constant uncertainty of the weather every planting and harvesting season. Most farms don't ever make a profit after the yearly operating cost is deducted from earnings, and the little profit that on occasion appear, goes right back into paying debt or reinvesting in renewing long overdue old equipment.\n\nMy position, and all those similar to mine in agriculture, are in all fairness, very low skilled, with minimum training, and therefore is only worth minimum wage, in my opinion. I was actually offered a higher amount but in the end turned it down because on the job, I discovered the only thing I bring to the table is manual labor (I know that's not really the right way to go about wages, but I do believe that wages should be based on the irreplaceableness of one's skills, and as it stands, although no replacements were ever found, I am very much easily replaceable, skill wise). That, compared to a slightly better paid Starbucks position, with benefits (most farm workers and owners don't have benefits or pension, yes owners too), air conditioning, regular work hours. I mean, if it wasn't for my particular interest for agriculture I'd pick Starbucks any day too!\n\nI think a couple issues are at hand, \n1. Most of agriculture's profit ends up in the corporate processing and supermarkets, that needs to change, workers could benefit, as well as consumers, from distributing that profit between farmers and shoppers.\n2. Agriculture in today's context no longer fit the modern life, although I strongly think that A LOT of people can benefit from getting their hands dirty once in a while and sweating a bit, improve physical and mental health, have better discipline all that jazz. So foreign workers are the temporary solution, if well regulated so that Canadian PR and citizens are ALWAYS prioritized for hire and at a fair wage. This cannot happen unless farmers can turn a profit, stated in point 1.\n3. A new generation of farmers are needed to take over, and they need to be somehow convinced that it is worth the toil, because as it stands, it is not, financially, life style wise. Automation is one solution, although therein lies the huge, foreseeable risk of corporate takeover.\n4. On a specific note, TFW does mandate that workers are provided up to standard housing (not always followed), which puts local workers at a huge disadvantage if they are commuting to work and paying rent, although that rarely happens, and the majority of farms do offer housing to all.\n\n\nI am aware that me being treated up to regulation is not the norm among my TFW peers, which is quite sad and unacceptable. But in my opinion, even if given a leveled playing field, wages , conditions, housing, etc. Canadian citizens and PRs largely will be unable to meet the demand for these jobs, from unwillingness to work really hard physically, unwillingness to live the lifestyle, wanting a career with better prospects... these are harsh words, but I believe to be true, and they also come from a lot of older generation farmers talking about their children and grandchildren. \n\nThis is just in the agri industry, and from what I hear from farmers from all over western Canada : )

As someone who has been in Canada my entire life (except the odd travels), I would leave Canada if I could. Unfortunately I have family circumstances that require me to be available for my family in a short timespan (so I've bought a house within one hour drive from my parents with my partner). But if my life circumstances were different (and I can convince my partner) - I'd be out of Canada within a few months, once I find a job overseas. It's quite depressing here and I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel. \nNote: I do not live in the Toronto area or the Vancouver area but still a pretty medium/large city.

Only a fool would move from Canada to America - or a billionaire, or a lawyer or doctor. And basically that tells you everything you need to know. Normal people can't afford to be ill, can't afford to need recourse to the law and most of all are going to get shot by either an out-of-control terrified policeman or the next person they cut off at a junction.\nAlso, who wants to live in a country where everyone thinks they are superior to the entire rest of the world because their average calorie intake is enough to feed three normal humans? - AND I speak as someone who is really quite fat in the UK. ( but I'm only a 'medium' in America. :) )

I love that you have taken interest in our country Canada. The one thing I found interesting was you kept talking about safe spots in your country where you don't have to worrie about gun violence and school shooting. Where are they? I live in Canada near the boarder and everyday we hear about this shooting or this one. Seems to be happening more is small and medium size towns then major city's. I saw an interesting stat in feb At the time there where 3080 people kill so far that year by shooting. Only a month in and more people had died from shootings then in 9/11.

I like your channel and as a Canadian friend a forest for the trees situation may I point out. Gun violence/kids(schools) Schools are filled with kids with a certain percentage being somewhat unstable not being fully formed human beings yet I.e. hormones and such, not even taking into account mental health issues for some. Then being immersed in a culture of having free and easy access to guns means wether you live in a small medium or large city it can happen to you and yours and just because it hasn’t yet don’t fool yourself thinking oh I live in a good part of the U.S. and school shootings don’t happen here.Forest for the trees my friend

Big city living in the States definitely a little different than small and medium city life. All in all, I dont like NYC either, and I live in the state.

Was so interesting to listen to your video. I have an immigrant wife and Autistic son, and can honestly say we have never had to wait that long for specialty medical services ever. The one important note is that we are in the Peterborough Ontario area a city of approximately 100,000 with a modern hospital and specialists including a Cardiology Centre. If you choose to live in a more densely populated area like Toronto then for sure there are some longer waiting times.My suggestion to newly arrived immigrants is to choose a medium to smaller size town.\nP.S. Income taxes are higher in California compared to Ontario and. no medical coverage.

This makes me laugh...., USA vs. African culture is 2 very different extremes. Especially when African's come and live in the most isolated depressing states in the USA.??USA culture is a little more vibrant and friendly in the Southern States that are always warm most of the year.. In certain areas. The midwest part of the USA and north states, less expensive to live. But our midwest areas are crumbling and are severely depressing. The USA is changing too, as kids us Americans grew up with a very different lifestyle and we played outside and knew our neighbors and cohabitated more...Even in the north. On the flip side I know any American trying to keep up with a African lifestyle, we would just drop dead of exhaustion?? If you are African, your phone rings every 5 minutes, relatives and friends call 24/7 Africans have dinners and celebrations for hours and hours until 4am in the morning (even on school work nights), and Africans just show up and walk into each others houses at any moment with no call all day??.. We don't have the energy plus we value privacy. I wish there was a happy medium!??

I think a difference that is not often enough scrutinized is how radically different the population distribution is. Most canadians live in large cities like the greater areas of Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver and Calgary that make much over 50% of the population, Whereas the vast majority of Americans live in medium cities, Canada is all about very large cities and small ones; and its culture is also driven by that. There is no equivalent of christian small town culture here on the scale that it exists in the US.