How many Canadian citizens, percent of population wise, seek to immigrate to the US, and vice-versa?
I don;t know any Canadian immigrants, but i’ve known (a few years ago) Americans who moved to Canada. That I realize that means nothing is why I seek answers here.
Peace,
mangeprge
I personally know a couple of families who immigrated from Canada but neither was native to Canada. Each told me independently that it was easier to immigrate to the US from Canada than from their home country, and easier to immigrate to Canada from their home country than the US. They used Canada as a stepping stone to get to the US.
I mention this because even if you find hard numbers cases like this will skew the data.
(I know another family who did the same thing using Brasil as the stepping stone country so it isn’t unique to Canada)
The time period is important, too. It’s a lot harder now that it was a generation ago, and a century ago the border was basically open.
I know many Canadians in the US. Anecdotes are not data, but I think these categories are pretty valid:
- families settled near the border and ignored it, with lots of back-and-forthing
- to CA or NYC in the Depression, following work.
- for education, fell in love, stayed
- for education, got a job, stayed
- Candian-born child of Americans in Canada; family returned
Most of the US Canadians I know were the first generation born in Canada, and so they don’t have strong ties. My mother is an exception: I’ve heard many different reasons over the years, but I think “feel safest with an international border between self and family” is probably the real answer.
I would guess that “fell in love, immigrated” “for a job, fell in love, stayed” and “for a job, stayed” would be the other three big categories, I just don’t know anyone in them.
Just an anecdote, I know, but in any case:
Our family immigrated from the US to Canada (Montreal) in 1972. There were five of us. We intended to live in Canada permanently, but we ended up moving back to the US in 1977.
That’s interesting. What happened?
Lost job?
Missed your home?
Fell out of love? (Just kidding, I know you said “we”.)
Sarah Palin saw you and came running with guns blazing because she though you were Russians.
Seriously, do you know why? That’s part of what I wonder about.
Just for some statistics: According to the numbers available from the Department of Homeland Security, about 9,300 people born in Canada were naturalized as U.S. Citizens in FY 2011, and 12,800 got Green Cards. Going the other way, I wasn’t able to easily find statistics on the number of U.S. citizens who naturalized as Canadians, but 9,200 American citizens were granted permanent resident status in Canada.
We were originally in the Philadelphia area.
My mother had family in Montreal. My uncle owned a small lumberyard, specializing in moldings. He suffered a stroke in the early 70s and could no longer manage it. My father was asked to come up and take over the management. So that’s why we moved there. I was ten years old.
At that time it was easy to move to Canada, and moving to Montreal was no more difficult than anywhere else. There were no language laws yet, and there was a thriving English community into which we fit right in.
In 1976-1977 the first language laws started being enacted, especially in 1977 with the election for the first time of the Parti Québécois, the separatists. I was fifteen in 1977 and probably could have managed fine. For one thing I was grandfathered in, so I was allowed to continue in English schools. The problem was my dad. He figured at the age of 46 he’d never be able to get his French good enough to compete for a job in these new circumstances (the lumberyard was failing for other reasons). He’d already learned two second languages fluently in his life (his birth language is Hungarian), and he felt that was enough.
So we moved back to the US. But he also wanted to get away from cold winters, so we moved to Los Angeles. About as different from Montreal as one could imagine.
I worked with a woman who was born in Minnesota in the 1960s, the doctor in Rainy River was unable to attend her and she was born in Baudette MN. She has lived all her life as a Canadian, but recently got her passport etc to facilitate her plans to retire to Florida and live there full time or at least winters. I know a few other born in USA types who have legal status in Canada due to their parents being citizens, and ended up moving here for work or change of pace, or particular life circumstances that made Canada a better /safer bet. I know a few women who have gone to the US to work (TN status for nurses) and ended up staying for the usual reasons (love, or “hey it beats -40”) but do not know anyone who went for permanent American Citizen status.
Oh, yes and one of my Dad’s cousins went to graduate school in Minneapolis. He married an American. They live in Canada and have since the early 1970s.
So what are the major differences between living in Canada and the US? (And by Canada I’m referring to English-speaking Canada).
From the perspective of the UK both societies seem much the same.