Disclaimer - Note that this is just our experience. Others may have experienced differently!
The biggest difference is the peace of mind that you have here in Canada. Life on an H1B visa bought a lot of apprehension. In the US, we woke up with some outrageous tweet or article cutting down some benefit of H1B program or H4EAD. Travelling to India had to be planned affair because we required stamping most of the time, eating up our vacation. If you wanted to visit any other foreign destination and you didn't have a Canadian or American passport then that would be another big adventure! With Canadian PR, you can enter and exit Canada with just your PR card. No stamping needed and you also get entry to several destinations like Jamaica with just your PR card.
Coming to day-to-day, you have the same big stores (with a dash of local ones) and the price varies depending on the store you are visiting. Target used to be the upscale store and Walmart was the discount store. So you have variety and the same thing here in Canada. The quality of perishable goods is good here in Walmart at Halifax. It also contains more items like spices, paneer etc. of Indian or other South Asian origin. The place we were in US was North Carolina and was one of the hubs where Indian and South Asian people lived. Thereby, there were multiple Indian stores within a mile of where we stayed. In Halifax, you have just about 4-5 stores for the entire Halifax but seems to satisfy our needs. Same goes for the restaurants. There are few Indian restaurants too in Halifax. Obviously the experience would be different in Toronto or Vancouver with a very large Indian population. For my coffee-loving folks, there is Starbucks but the biggest chain here is Tim Hortons. Some of the big stores like Target and Dunkin Donuts are not there here. But instead you have Canadian Tire (which is great!) and several local coffee shops. A lot of retailers are environmentally focused and charge even for plastic bags - Forcing you have your own bag.
In terms of healthcare, you have free clinics and helplines. Make sure that you read reviews of the clinics you go to. You can even get minor procedures in a week. You also have walk-in clinics. We had lesser wait-times for even dental appointments i.e. we got it in a week whereas in the US it took us months. Dental and vision benefits are not free. They work the same as in the US i.e. check what your employer's benefits pay and pay the rest.
Another thing was public libraries. They are not just for children but even catered to adults. They are free and you can rent books, audio books and much more. You also have several meetups there too. Very lively and many people visit it.
Renting an apartment might be a downgraded experience because the websites were updated once a day. We had to go physically and speak to the managers. But good thing we did that because these folks have knowledge and directed us to places, that we liked. Ultimately we finalized our apartment in a week.
Banking is a different animal. All traditional banks require you to maintain a minimum daily balance of 3000 CAD else they have a monthly charge of 5 CAD. Traditional banking was good from a service perspective until we got settled here. Their online website experience can be bad and not what we were used to with Bank of America. Now we have moved to Tangerine, which has 0 minimum balance requirement but no branches (customer service is via phone or email).
Biggest thing to note is that you can have a free USD account. All banks offer it. So you don't have to convert all your USD money to CAD unless you really want to. Also, you just your check book and don't have to be in US for the same. More in a banking post.
You can also trade on US exchanges on Canada. Your USD currency will come handy when you want to trade on US exchanges. More in a later post.
Public transportation options is better than what you have in North Carolina or Connecticut. You can use them to commute to work. Considering taxes, a lot of people have 1 car for the family. They use public transportation otherwise.
Hope this makes your transition to Canada easier!
Next steps -
The biggest difference is the peace of mind that you have here in Canada. Life on an H1B visa bought a lot of apprehension. In the US, we woke up with some outrageous tweet or article cutting down some benefit of H1B program or H4EAD. Travelling to India had to be planned affair because we required stamping most of the time, eating up our vacation. If you wanted to visit any other foreign destination and you didn't have a Canadian or American passport then that would be another big adventure! With Canadian PR, you can enter and exit Canada with just your PR card. No stamping needed and you also get entry to several destinations like Jamaica with just your PR card.
Coming to day-to-day, you have the same big stores (with a dash of local ones) and the price varies depending on the store you are visiting. Target used to be the upscale store and Walmart was the discount store. So you have variety and the same thing here in Canada. The quality of perishable goods is good here in Walmart at Halifax. It also contains more items like spices, paneer etc. of Indian or other South Asian origin. The place we were in US was North Carolina and was one of the hubs where Indian and South Asian people lived. Thereby, there were multiple Indian stores within a mile of where we stayed. In Halifax, you have just about 4-5 stores for the entire Halifax but seems to satisfy our needs. Same goes for the restaurants. There are few Indian restaurants too in Halifax. Obviously the experience would be different in Toronto or Vancouver with a very large Indian population. For my coffee-loving folks, there is Starbucks but the biggest chain here is Tim Hortons. Some of the big stores like Target and Dunkin Donuts are not there here. But instead you have Canadian Tire (which is great!) and several local coffee shops. A lot of retailers are environmentally focused and charge even for plastic bags - Forcing you have your own bag.
Coming to more serious topics like taxes, it will be a very different experience if you were staying in New Hampshire and shifted to Nova Scotia. Adjusting to 15% taxes is a huge thing. Since USD is stronger than CAD, you would be earning slightly lesser. But if you get a fair remuneration as per your area then you should be okay. Besides now with a PR, your spouse can also work and you can have a part-time income too. So, to conclude, while there are taxes you also have the freedom to have more sources of income. With both of us working, we didn't feel the pinch.
In terms of healthcare, you have free clinics and helplines. Make sure that you read reviews of the clinics you go to. You can even get minor procedures in a week. You also have walk-in clinics. We had lesser wait-times for even dental appointments i.e. we got it in a week whereas in the US it took us months. Dental and vision benefits are not free. They work the same as in the US i.e. check what your employer's benefits pay and pay the rest.
Another thing was public libraries. They are not just for children but even catered to adults. They are free and you can rent books, audio books and much more. You also have several meetups there too. Very lively and many people visit it.
Renting an apartment might be a downgraded experience because the websites were updated once a day. We had to go physically and speak to the managers. But good thing we did that because these folks have knowledge and directed us to places, that we liked. Ultimately we finalized our apartment in a week.
Banking is a different animal. All traditional banks require you to maintain a minimum daily balance of 3000 CAD else they have a monthly charge of 5 CAD. Traditional banking was good from a service perspective until we got settled here. Their online website experience can be bad and not what we were used to with Bank of America. Now we have moved to Tangerine, which has 0 minimum balance requirement but no branches (customer service is via phone or email).
Biggest thing to note is that you can have a free USD account. All banks offer it. So you don't have to convert all your USD money to CAD unless you really want to. Also, you just your check book and don't have to be in US for the same. More in a banking post.
You can also trade on US exchanges on Canada. Your USD currency will come handy when you want to trade on US exchanges. More in a later post.
Public transportation options is better than what you have in North Carolina or Connecticut. You can use them to commute to work. Considering taxes, a lot of people have 1 car for the family. They use public transportation otherwise.
Hope this makes your transition to Canada easier!
Next steps -
- Get started with Canada's express entry!
- Want to know our experience for the 1st few months? Read along here.
~Bienvenue Au Canada~
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