Canada among 10 most peaceful countries

By Mitch PotterWashington Bureau

WASHINGTON—Canada ranks for the first time among the world’s Top 10 most peaceful nations in a new global security assessment released Wednesday.

The Global Peace Index, which measures a complex array of 23 indicators ranging from levels of militarization to internal strife, incarceration and murder rates, placed Canada 8th internationally in 2011, jumping from 14th the previous year.

The assessment is likely to raise eyebrows in Toronto, where the violent scenes that attended last year’s G20 Summit remain a topic of heated debate.

Yet the GPI report, while assigning Canada a “slight rise in the likelihood of violent demonstrations,” downplayed events surrounding the G20 as a one-time blip more than offset by broader Canadian trends toward “societal safety and security.”

Canada’s high ranking comes in stark contrast to that of the United States, which placed 82nd among 153 countries analyzed, reflecting “much higher levels of militarization and involvement in external conflicts than its northern neighbour,” the report said.

Iceland, now recovering from the 2009 global economic meltdown and largely bereft of internal and external strife, regained 1st place in the 2011 GPI report, to be released Wednesday in Washington. Iceland is followed by New Zealand, Japan, Denmark and the Czech Republic. Small, stable democracies ranked highest, with 14 of the top 20 countries in western or central Europe.

The overall trend in 2011 suggests the world become “slightly less peaceful” over the past year, the report summarized, reflecting a higher potential for terrorism and violent demonstrations amid the political turmoil of the Arab Spring.

Somalia scored last, followed closely by Iraq, Sudan, Afghanistan and North Korea in the fifth annual report, compiled by the Institute for Economics and Peace in partnership with the Economist Intelligence Unit.

The measurement of peace is an evolving science and this year the GPI refined its approach, weighing 23 “qualitative and quantitative factors ranging from a nation’s level of military expenditure to its relations with neighbouring countries and the level of respect for human rights.”

Canada’s rise in the global ranks came, in part, as others fell. But the GPI credited Ottawa for achieving a thaw during 2010 in neighbourly relations, as trade tensions with the United States receded and Canada dialed down rhetoric on arctic sovereignty, easing relations with Norway, Russia and others.

“The reality is if you go down each of these 23 indicators, society is quite distinctly safer in Canada — and the difference of some 80 places above the United States is considerable,” Clyde McConaghy, president and co-founder of the GPI, told the Toronto Star.

“Even taking into account the G20 spike, Canada has startling distinctions that measure very well.”

Among other factors, the report credits Canada for “a moderately sophisticated and capable military sphere,” noting Canada’s defence budget has “broad declined” as a proportion of overall government spending since 1964, when three military branches were reorganized into the Canadian Armed Forces.

Limited access to small arms and light weapons and a comparatively low incarceration rate of 117 per 100,000 people in 2010 also elevated Canada in the global rankings.

Mideast countries struggling through the Arab Spring also saw a collapse in their global rankings, with Libya, Bahrain and Egypt falling farthest, in that order. But GPI officials acknowledge the possibility of “one step backward to go two steps forward” as the hope for many countries in the region.

“The question remains whether countries such as Libya, which experienced a huge fall, will be able to put in place more effective forms of government that will improve society for their own people,” said McConaghy.

The intent behind the GPI is to break new analytical ground on understanding “the conditions and structures that typify peaceful nations,” thereby offering a pathway for others to follow suit, he said.

“We don’t believe in failed states. We try to make no moral judgment on why and where (individual countries) are,” he said. He points to Angola — a country consistently rising from deep crisis 10 years ago — as an example of how “bottom-dwellers” are able to become “movers and shakers” toward stability and prosperity.

“As the research deepens, we now understand the structures of peace better than ever before,” said McConaghy. The findings, he said, provide “an actionable proposition” to show “these are the sorts of levers we need to pull to make more peaceful societies.”

Timmins opens new Immigration multicultural centre

Image via Wikipedia

By Len Gillis / lgillis@timminstimes.com

Updated 17 hours ago

There is a new welcome mat out in Timmins for immigrants who are seeking jobs and a new life in Canada.

The new Timmins and District Multicultural Centre was officially opened this week with an office and a resource person, Andrée Fortin, located in the Timmins Economic Development Corporation building at 12 Elm Street North.

The purpose of the office is to recognize the growing numbers of immigrants to Northern Ontario, to attract more of them to Timmins and to do whatever it takes to help new people and their families adjust to life here.

Christy Marinig, the CEO of the TEDC, welcomed guests to the office Tuesday saying the new centre comes about after roughly five years of effort on the immigration file.

"This is a very important day for the Timmins Economic Development Corporation and the city of Timmins," she said.

"It has been about five years that Cathy Ellis and Brenda Camirand really took the immigration initiative and started to develop it because we recognized there was a need for employers to bring new skill-sets into the community and that required newcomers," said Marinig.

"And there's also a lot of people interested in Northern Ontario, moving to Northern Ontario. Certainly not the numbers we're seeing in Toronto, but we are seeing people moving here and they do need the support services to be able to stay here, find employment and raise their families and enjoy everything that Northern Ontario and Timmins has to offer," said Marinig.

She added that she is pleased the new centre in Timmins has developed a partnership with the North Bay and District Multicultural Centre which has already been in operation for several years.

"Their leadership and expertise came in very handy and we saw it as a win-win situation to partner with them, because we believe it is important to work together," she added.

The North Bay office is headed up by executive director Don Currie who explained that his office will help the Timmins office through its growth period of providing immigrant settlement services.

"We opened in January 2008. So we've got about three and a half year's experience that Timmins doesn't have in this," said Currie, adding that immigration is now a pan-Northern effort.

"Actually all the five major cities in Northern Ontario are working together on attracting immigrants and Timmins has actually taken the lead on the marketing front. There is now actually a marketing campaign going on for immigrants to come to Northern Ontario," said Currie.

Currie explained that new immigrants will require help on a variety of concerns that many of us take for granted and that's why it's important to have a local office.

"It can be help finding a school for your kids. They won't know there are four different school boards in Timmins. They may need English or French language training. They may need help understanding the banking system, or how to get a Health Card, all the obvious things that we take for granted. So if you come to a new country, you don't know that," said Currie.

"Another big part of it is matching them with somebody who have lived here for awhile. So somebody with similar interests, similar age hopefully, can show them the best places to shop, where to find a provincial park and that kind of stuff," he said.

Currie said there will soon be a public effort to attract volunteers. There are already a few who have come forward in Timmins. He said North Bay has nearly 40 such volunteers.

Timmins mayor Tom Laughren said he was pleased to see the new centre opening.

"This is a very, very important endeavour for our community," said Laughren adding that many employers in Timmins face challenges of finding skilled workers, especially at a time when so many in the "baby boomer" generation are retiring.

Laughren added that Timmins has a history of acceptance of immigrants going back 100 years when the community was founded and then again in the post WW2 years.

Vancouver: From 'European' to 'Eurasian'

By DOUGLAS TODD

Source: The Vancouver Sun

Vancouver was once considered a "European" city. Now it's more accurate to call it "Eurasian."

In less than two generations, Vancouver has transformed from a city dominated by people of British, German and Italian origin to one in which people of Asian heritage make up the majority.

The demographic changes in this city of more than half a million people are most readily seen in the hundreds of restaurants serving Chinese, Indian, Filipino, Japanese, Arabic, Afghan, Malaysian and Korean food. But the changes go much deeper.

Since the early 1970s -after Canadian immigration laws made the country more open to Asians and multicultural policies were instituted - the city has developed a whole new personality, one that's attempting, in fits and starts, to fuse Atlantic and Pacific cultures.

"The makeup of the city has fundamentally changed" in the past few decades, says Baldwin Wong, a social planner with the City of Vancouver who specializes in ethnic diversity issues and helps develop programs for new immigrants.

Wong's own story illustrates the immigration trends of the past 40 years, since he was part of the first wave of Hong Kong residents who flew into the city to begin a new life in the early 1970s.

Statistics compiled by Vancouver city hall tell the story of the new Asian wave.

In 1971, three out of four of the city's 426,000 residents had English as their mother tongue.

Just six per cent of residents had Chinese as their mother tongue, while five per cent spoke German, three per cent grew up speaking Italian and three per cent were raised in French. In addition, people who were most familiar with a Scandinavian, South Asian, Greek or Spanish language accounted for about one per cent each of the population.

By 2006, the city's European atmosphere had been dramatically adjusted by new Asian immigrants fluent in everything from Mandarin to Korean, Hindi to Farsi.

Only 49 per cent of the growing city's 578,000 residents had English as a mother tongue, according to the 2006 census, which is the last year for which Statistics Canada census figures are available.

Meanwhile, 21 per cent reported that one of the various forms of Chinese was their first language. Another two per cent of Vancouverites said they had Punjabi as a mother tongue, while almost two per cent spoke Vietnamese at home, almost two per cent spoke Tagalog (Filipino) and roughly one per cent each were most familiar with Korean or Japanese.

Given the tens of thousands of immigrants from Asia who have moved into the city of Vancouver since 2006, the East Asian and South Asian percentages of the population only will have risen since the last census. One out of two Vancouverites is now foreign-born.

The latest data on the city's ethnic demographics may emerge from this year's major census. However, the full numerical picture may not come to light -despite the efforts of Statistics Canada's census workers.

A host of people and organizations have protested the federal Conservative government's announcement that filling out the 2011 long-form census will be "voluntary," rather than "mandatory," as in the past.

Specialists say that change will result in more unreliable data, since research shows there will inevitably be far fewer responses on the crucial longform census from immigrants, particularly those who struggle with English or French.

While the 2011 census data may not be as solid as in the past, Vancouver's schools are keeping good statistics reflecting the latest trend lines in immigration.

More than 4,000 new students have signed up for Vancouver schools in each of the past five years. Wong says those families come from 140 different countries.

More than half of the new kindergarten-to-Grade 12 students in Vancouver are from China.

More than one in 10 of the new students are from the Philippines, and another one in 10 are from South Korea, followed by those from Taiwan and the United States. About one in five are transferring from other parts of Canada.

How are Vancouver's eclectic European and Asian-rooted residents getting along in this city, which has grown by more than 100,000 since the 1970s?

"Canada has really opened up. I think the city is wonderful in its ethnic diversity. Young people in particular report that colour is just not an issue for them," says Wong.

Harmony, however, is not entirely supreme among Vancouverites of different ethnicities.

Wong and others acknowledge that, because of language barriers, elementary and highschool students often "seem more comfortable socializing with people like themselves" on playgrounds and after school.

Another challenge of high immigration into the city, acknowledges Wong, is the increasing lack of suitable jobs, particularly for the highly educated professionals crossing the Pacific in recent years from East Asia.

To get around the problem of under-employment for foreign-strained medical workers, engineers, botanists and other specialists, the City of Vancouver has initiated the Mentorship Pilot Project. It aims to link newcomers to the city's formal and informal employment networks.

The Mentorship Pilot Project should prove valuable, says Wong, because discrimination based on ethnicity can still be a problem in hiring in Vancouver.

So can language differences. Wong says would-be employers, whether Caucasian, East Asian or South American, tend to hire people with whom they can easily communicate through a common language.

To further assist immigrants gain access to social services, the City of Vancouver has set up help lines and websites available in five Asian languages. Indeed, the city's new 311 referral service aims, ultimately, to provide interpreters who can handle more than 100 languages.

City of Vancouver staff are "on the front lines" when it comes to dealing with a host of diversity issues, Wong says. Responding to the city's foreign newcomers requires a good deal of their energy.

If one had any doubt, consider that the non-English links on the City of Vancouver's official website now receive more hits than almost anything else.

 

Chinese professionals strive for career success in Canada

When Judy Wu moved to Canada in fall 2003 on a student visa, her objective was to join her then- boyfriend, now her husband, who was already studying here.

Almost eight years later, Judy works for one of Canada's largest banks, a position that makes her the envy of many of her Chinese acquaintances.

Judy, a native of Shandong province, attributes her career growth in Canada to the hard work she put in first improving her English language ability and then earning an MBA from a Canadian university, as well as a stroke of luck in job hunting.

During her last year in the MBA program, a manager from her future employer's commercial banking unit gave a lecture to the MBA students, and Judy so impressed the manager that she was invited for a job interview right away. After several rounds of interviews at the bank, Judy was offered a job in the commercial banking unit and started working in 2007, a few months after her graduation that summer.

"Unlike many others, my job search was quite smooth," she reminisced.

Securing a job in banking, a highly respected professional field, is notoriously competitive. Getting into the banking field was a big achievement for a Chinese immigrant looking for her first job in Canada.

Among the more than 100 workers in Judy's unit, she is the only person originally from China's mainland. In contrast, many new immigrants have to either switch careers or take entry-level jobs in a field in which they already have had years of experience in their native countries.

No statistics is available, but anecdotes suggest that upon arriving in Canada, a large number of Chinese professionals have gone back to school to acquire skills more in demand in Canada, thus abandoning their previous career path; or take lower-level positions in their professional field. Many, particularly those who cannot overcome the language barrier, end up working for businesses specifically targeting the ethnic Chinese population.

Many who immigrate to Canada under the skilled worker program initially face the language hurdle. They may have a good grasp of English in the context of their professions, yet the language barrier remains in daily interactions with English-speakers in their work and social environments.

Immediately upon landing in Canada, Judy focused on improving her English by enrolling in intensive language training programs. Improved language ability paved the path for her eventually joining the almost 500,000 professionals working in Canada's banking industry.

"Most Chinese are very good at studying. But without English ability, one cannot achieve career growth in Canada," Judy said.

Colin Chu, who works in the IT department of a leading service provider for banks and insurance companies, agrees with Judy's observation. Having honed his English skills while a PH.D. candidate in computer science at a university in Singapore, Colin focused his efforts on first understanding the local job market upon moving to Canada in 2008. After two to three months of attending various training programs and connecting with head hunters and other agencies, Colin gained understanding of what local employers expect of their recruits and secured his current job after applying to a handful of employers.

"Many rush into sending out resumes immediately upon arriving here, which may not be effective,"said Colin. "A more effective way is to first research the local job market and become well- prepared before launching the search."

Come prepared, Colin was able to project a confidence in his professional achievement, his potentials for growth, and an easy going personality that boded well for team work, in no small measure thanks to his ability to communicate effectively in English, in the several rounds of interviews.

He was among the minority who secured their first job with a large Canadian company. A far more common career path for new immigrants is to work for smaller companies in the beginning and then moving to larger businesses as one's experience grows.

However, language ability is only the first step. A much bigger challenge for Chinese immigrants, or immigrants from many other countries, is reconcile cultural differences and build a network of professional and social contacts to aid career growth.

Despite their good launches from the start line, both Judy and Colin voice the sense that they seem to be hitting a glass ceiling at their respective workplaces due to cultural differences and lack of a professional network.

Both agree that a precondition for promotions and other growth opportunities is developing relationships with one's supervisor and other senior managers, not just in work-related matters but also on a personal level. This requires not just language ability but also cultural affinity, which could be challenging for those who grew up in an entirely different cultural environment.

If these new immigrants are looking for guidance and advice from a mentor, few fits the bill better than Tao Thomas Qu, who was among the first Chinese students venturing overseas in the 1980's and is today the Strategic Improvement Manager at Ontario Power Generation Nuclear.

In addition to language ability, Tao cites the following key factors in immigrants' successfully adjusting to their new country.

Immigrants must not restrict their social circles to within the Chinese community, Tao maintained. "One must establish a network of contacts and friends with native Canadians in the community."

Leadership skill development is integral to career advancement, Tao noted, citing his own experience in taking advantage of leadership training programs at ONG as well as developing leadership skills and experience through involvement in community services, which are highly regarded in Canada.

"Everyone acknowledges the glass ceiling (for foreign professionals) exists, including Canadians," Tao noted. "It is nothing to hide."

However, the outlook is "positive."

Glass ceiling or not, both Colin and Judy already have their eyes set on the next stage of their respective careers.

Colin aims to join a global company to gain more international experience, while Judy thinks her next big opportunity lies in the growing affluent Chinese community in Canada and the expanding global reach of China-based companies. She wants to join the Asian Banking unit of one of the big global banks.

"We must take advantage of our Chinese heritage to compete successfully," she said. 

Source:Xinhua

How is Canada Going to Handle the Debt from Baby Boomers in 2020?

Image via Wikipedia“William Robson, CEO and president of the C.D. Howe Institute, reports that Canada will have a liability of $1.5 trillion over the next five decades”
By Pawan Shamdasani, Staff Writer

Canada is recognized for being one of the world’s most indebted countries today by the Fraser Institute. In the past decade, Canada’s national debt reached more than 70% of GDP, but since then successive finance ministers have managed to reduce it down through continued surpluses. However, as thousands of baby boomers approach the retirement line, this will fundamentally change the Canadian labour market and lead to a soaring federal budget deficit.

Since the 1950s, there has been a steady decline in Canada’s birth rate.  Also, there are not enough immigrants arriving. “So the “providing ratio” — that is, the number of working-aged Canadians relative to those over 65 — will fall,” states Matthew McClearn, of Canadian Business magazine. Currently the ratio is 5:1, but experts expect it to decrease to half by 2040.

This will result in an erosion of the tax base as more retirees outnumber the young people who intend to replace them in the workforce. By the next decade, the number of retirees relative to those in the workforce will grow by 7%.

Government spending will rise as the graying population indulge themselves on pensions, health care benefits and old-age benefits, resulting in a fiscal squeeze for Ottawa and the provinces. At the moment, health, education and elderly and child benefits account for 15% of GDP. However, by 2056, these expenses will shoot up to more than 19%.

This represents almost $68 billion in additional government spending each year, which Canada is not prepared to absorb. William Robson, CEO and president of the C.D. Howe Institute, reports that Canada will have a liability of $1.5 trillion over the next five decades.

A combination of fiscal and non-fiscal measures will be necessary to tighten the demographic squeeze alongside policies to enhance labour productivity and make up for the declining workforce. Canada will also require more budgetary discipline which has enabled it to reduce its debt over the past 10 years.

A careful examination of the rising social costs for healthcare and public pensions will be likely as well. But it is clear that many young Canadians will have to work longer before retiring and pay higher taxes than previous generations.

“Permanent fiscal actions – either through increased taxes or reduced program spending, or some combination of both, will be needed to avoid ever-increasing government deficits,” says Kevin Page, parliamentary budget officer. He warns that if corrective measures are not implemented quickly, the problem will grow “exponentially.” If imposed after 10 years, the solution could cost about $30 billion in spending cuts or tax hikes.

These demographic pressures will possibly lead to a grim financial future. At the end of 2008, Canada’s federal debt was about $458 billion. However, Dale Orr, an independent forecaster, anticipates $150 billion in additional government debt until 2014-15 due to the financial crisis. He believes that the financial burden will not be as harsh as in the 1990s.

Christopher Ragan, an economics professor at McGill University, expects the demographic squeeze to be felt largely between 2020 and 2040. He claims that we could be left in a vulnerable situation of rising interest rates and dwindling money supplies that instead could be contributed towards social spending. In other words, Canada would be subject to debt levels similar to the mid-1990s.

The government and politicians need to think long term and realize the risks of changing demographics if we are to save Canada from diving into an era of increasing deficits.

By Pawan Shamdasani, Staff Writer

ARB Team
Arbitrage Magazine
Business News with BITE.

Related articles

• Retiring boomers create immigrant opportunities (theglobeandmail.com)
• Tough decisions needed to update Canada’s fiscal house (theglobeandmail.com)

Vancouver attracting buyers from China

By Hui-yong Yu and Christopher Donville

Bloomberg News

PREV 1 of 3 NEXT 

This house is in the Shaughnessy neighborhood of Vancouver, B.C., one of the hottest real-estate areas in one of the priciest cities in the world.

Vancouver's Royal Pacific Realty had such a surge of business during the first two weeks of February that employees worked day and night shifts to find homes for Chinese buyers visiting the Canadian city for the Lunar New Year.

"It was unprecedented," said CEO David Choi. "I called them sleepwalkers."

Sales of detached homes, town houses and condominiums in metropolitan Vancouver jumped 70 percent in February from January, to 3,097 units from 1,819, and were up 25 percent from a year earlier, according to the Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver.

In March, sales climbed 32 percent from February, to just shy of a record for the month of 4,371 transactions set in 2004. Sales increased by 80 percent from two years ago.

Buyers from mainland China are leading a wave of Asian investment in Vancouver as China tries to damp real-estate speculation at home.

Good schools, a moderate climate and the large, established Asian community as a result of Canada's liberal immigration policy make Vancouver attractive, said Cathy Gong, who moved from Shanghai to the Shaughnessy neighborhood about three years ago.

"The schools here are the best and there are a lot of Chinese people here," said Gong, whose son is in sixth-grade. Eastern Canada wasn't an option because "I cannot bear cold weather," Gong said.

Vancouver has the second-largest immigrant Chinese population in Canada after Toronto.

China, where home prices rose 28 percent in Beijing and 26 percent in Shanghai last year, according to the country's biggest real-estate website owner, SouFun Holdings, has taken steps to curb property speculation.

Chinese home prices gained for 19 straight months through December and climbed in almost all 70 cities tracked by the government during the first quarter.

Premier Wen Jiabao placed curbs on mortgage lending, boosted down-payment requirements and limited the number of purchases.

"As the Chinese get more and more prosperous, they are diversifying their assets out of China," said Jim Rogers, an American investor. "Vancouver is very high on the list."

In 2010, Vancouver had the third-highest housing costs among English-speaking cities worldwide, according to Canada's Frontier Centre for Public Policy. Only Hong Kong and Sydney, another magnet of Asian immigration, were more expensive.

Vancouver's median home price of $602,000 Canadian ($618,000 in U.S. dollars) was 9.5 times the annual median household income of $63,100, the group said in a study released Jan. 24. Canada had a 4.6 national multiple, making it "seriously unaffordable," while the U.S. at 3.3 was "moderately unaffordable," the study showed. To be affordable, the multiple must be 3 or less.

Vancouver was more expensive than San Francisco, London and New York by that measure, the center said.

"This makes it all the more difficult for people who are already struggling to get into the market or businesses who can't hire people to come here because of the high housing prices," said Peter Ladner, a former Vancouver city councilor and a columnist for the Business in Vancouver weekly newspaper.

Unlike London or New York, "we don't have enough jobs with high incomes to justify" the home prices, said Ladner.

Cecilia Huang, a Canada resident since 2003, also is concerned about rising prices.

"I hope the government can do something to control the price" so younger generations can buy, said Huang, who paid almost $1 million Canadian for a condo in the Kitsilano neighborhood two months ago so her daughter, now 6, could attend school nearby.

"Pretty incredible"

Mainland Chinese are buying houses primarily in Vancouver's westside, boosting the median sales price to $2 million Canadian in the district known for its wide boulevards, beaches, expansive parks and stucco Tudor mansions. Prime westside neighborhoods include Point Grey, Shaughnessy and Dunbar. The University of British Columbia is in the area.

"Our office has done 50 sales this year, which is pretty incredible," said Vancouver Realtor Tom Gradecak at his office in Point Grey, where he has one colleague who speaks Mandarin and Cantonese and is hiring a second. "Half of those sales are from mainland China."

One Chinese buyer paid $1.7 million in March for a five-bedroom, three-bath house that the previous owners had completely renovated in 2003, $150,000 more than the asking price, said Gradecak. The buyer plans to tear it down and build anew.

"There's more value in the land," Gradecak said. "We're seeing a lot of empty-nesters cashing out."

Many houses were built in the 1940s and '50s and have outdated electrical systems and plumbing and are "much smaller" than allowed today, said Vancouver architect Loy Leyland. As buyers prefer to demolish old houses than renovate, new homes for Asian clients make up two-thirds of his more than 30 current projects.

"I've never been busier," Leyland said.

Leyland's clients usually stick to traditional styles such as Villa or Georgian for exteriors. Inside, designs are changing. Every new house has two kitchens: a large Western-style one and a small "wok" kitchen with a stove, sink, strong exhaust fan and door to seal off cooking aromas, said Leyland.

Some buyers acquire multiple homes, one to live in and others for investment, said Chung, the broker. Her clients made their money in a variety of businesses, she said, including mining, stainless steel manufacturing and real estate. About 10 percent of them speak English, she said.

The westside had the biggest five-year gain of all 15 areas in greater Vancouver, according to the Real Estate Board. Westside home prices rose 77 percent during the past five years through April amid the housing collapse in the U.S.

In 2010, the average home price in greater Vancouver rose 14 percent from 2009, according to the Real Estate Board. Excluding the three most expensive areas — the westside, Richmond and West Vancouver — the average price gained 8 percent. The three priciest areas usually account for about one-third of annual home sales in greater Vancouver.

The current group of Chinese homebuyers is the third "wave" from Asia since 1990, after Taiwanese and Hong Kong immigration, said Manyee Lui, a veteran Vancouver real-estate broker. "People from mainland China are the new immigrants," Lui said.

Vancouver's Expo '86 was pivotal in the city's growth. In 1988, the Expo site downtown on the shore of False Creek was acquired by Concord Pacific Developments, with investors led by Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing. The group developed high-rise condos and sold them in Asia during the early 1990s.

Concord Pacific Place today is Canada's biggest master-planned urban community, with about 50 buildings of 10,000 homes, parks, a school and day-care centers.

"That was like turning on a switch; it's OK to invest in Vancouver because Li Ka-shing did," said Peter Cowley, director of school performance studies at the Fraser Institute, which grades schools in Canada on academic performance. Chinese immigrants routinely check the institute's website to decide where to buy homes.

Migration to Vancouver also was spurred by the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre and a flight from Hong Kong in the years before its return to Chinese rule from British sovereignty in 1997.

Vancouver home prices dropped when some people returned to Hong Kong after the handover.

British Columbia gets about 55 percent of Canada's investor-class immigrants, people who have a minimum net worth of $1.6 million Canadian, said Cameron Muir, chief economist of the British Columbia Real Estate Association.

The province drew a total 3,779 investor-class immigrants from China last year, or 69 percent of all investors moving to British Columbia, said Muir.

Starting about 18 months ago, so many homeowners applied to change the last two digits of their addresses to remove or shift the number 4, which in Chinese sounds like the word for death, or add the numeral 8, which is considered lucky, that Vancouver began turning down some requests, said Bonnie Lee, addressing coordinator for the city.

"We used to do eight or nine a month, but in March we did 25," said Lee. "A lot of it is cultural. A lot of it is just people trying to change it before they list because agents are telling them to."

It's not just the Chinese who are shopping for homes, said Gradecak. South Korean and Taiwanese buyers also have been active, he said.

"Foreign investment in Vancouver residential real estate is showing no signs of slowing," said Gregory Klump, chief economist of the Ottawa-based Canadian Real Estate Association, in a May 9 report.

The surge of multimillion-dollar sales in Vancouver prompted the trade group to revise its forecast for national home sales. It now expects Canada home sales through the Multiple Listing Service to fall 1.3 percent in 2011 to 441,100 units, less than the 1.6 percent decline it forecast in February.

"A psychological fear"

Low interest rates inflated home prices and created a bubble, said Lawrence Wong, an immigration lawyer with many Chinese clients. (Unlike the U.S., Canada has no tax deduction for mortgage interest.)

"There is this psychological fear that 'OK, if I don't get into the market, I might not be able to get in later on," said Wong.

Chinese buyers frequently are absentee owners, wealthy businessmen who buy second or third houses for their wives and children while continuing to live in China for work, said Norman Chow, a fourth-generation Canadian engineer.

"You see a lot of these satellite families," said Chow.

He said it's not unusual to see college-age kids of wealthy Chinese parents driving Bentleys, Maseratis and Porsches around the westside. "The kids seem pretty nice," he said.

Forty-one percent of the pupils at the neighborhood's Maple Grove Elementary have English as their second language, according to the Fraser Institute.

While education for children often is the primary goal, some immigrants just want to move money out of China because they don't feel it's safe, according to one homebuyer who moved to Vancouver from Wuhan with her son two months ago and asked that her name not be used. Her husband remains in Wuhan for work.

Interest also is spreading to other parts of Vancouver. The latest hot markets are West Vancouver and the southern bedroom community of White Rock, said Raymond Wong, a local real-estate agent.

Because houses in West Vancouver are built on the mountainside with their backs to the Coast Range, they generally face south, providing views of English Bay and Burrard Inlet. This conforms to the principles of feng shui, the proper placement of features within and surrounding a house to increase wealth and deflect bad luck, said Wong.

In November, Osaka Supermarket, part of Canada's biggest grocery chain, opened its second Vancouver-area store in West Vancouver's Park Royal shopping center. Osaka offers items ranging from marinated duck wings to a full dim sum bar and Asian fruits such as mangosteens..

"Five years ago, Chinese buyers avoided West Vancouver because of the Lions Gate bridge — it just wasn't convenient," said Wong. "Now Osaka makes it much better, and Chinese people are spreading the word."

Beginning June 15, China Southern Airlines will offer Canada's first nonstop flights to China's most populous province, Guangdong, with service between Vancouver and Guangzhou, the province's capital city.

"Canada is a very attractive country these days for many reasons," said Rogers, the investor. "They've done a much better job than the U.S. has over the last 15 to 20 years."

Canada's natural resources-based economy has gained from the economic growth in China and other countries. The Canadian dollar climbed 70 percent against the U.S. dollar since 2002, reaching parity in 2007 for the first time since 1976 as rising prices for commodities such as oil and gold boosted export revenue.

Overseas homebuyers can act much more quickly on a purchase since their offers often aren't contingent on the sale of another residence, said Gradecak, the westside real-estate broker.

"It's definitely for real," Gradecak said. "How long it's going to last, that's an unknown. I get asked the same question every single day."

Meme-busting: Doctors are all leaving Canada to practice in the U.S.

By Aaron Carroll

I got such a great response to yesterday’s meme-busting post on tort reform and cost control that I decided to give you another.

Every time I talk about health care policy with physicians, one inevitably tells me of the doctor he or she knows who ran away from Canada to practice in the United States. Evidently, there’s a general perception that practicing in the United States is much more satisfying than in countries such as Canada.

If only that were so.

Let’s start with the underlying rationale. Satisfaction is measurable. The Commonwealth Fund measured it in its Survey of Primary Care Physicians in 11 Countries, 2009: Perspectives on Care, Costs, and Experiences:

Mail, phone, and e-mail survey of primary care physicians from February to July 2009 in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, United Kingdom, and United States

Samples: 1,016 Australia, 1,401 Canada, 502 France, 715 Germany, 844 Italy, 614 Netherlands, 500 New Zealand, 774 Norway, 1,450 Sweden, 1,062 United Kingdom, and 1,442 United States

Here’s what they found:

 

Except for Austria and Germany, fewer doctors were satisfied practicing medicine in the United States in 2009 than in any other surveyed country. That includes Canada. And it was before health care reform, so you can’t blame any dissatisfaction on the PPACA.

 They also asked physicians what they thought about the health care system (again this was before the PPACA):

 

Except for Germany, more physicians in the United Sates felt that the system needed to be completely rebuilt than physicians in any other country.  The United States tied with Germany for last with an overwhelming 82% of physicians who thought the system needed fundamental changes or to be completely rebuilt.

 So let’s stop pretending that doctors in outer countries are miserable, and practicing in the Unites States is paradise.

 But the main outcome of interest here is doctors emigrating from Canada.  The meme is that physicians are leaving Canada in droves and moving here.  Is that true?

  No:

The Canadian Institute for Health Information has been tracking doctors' destinations only since 1992. Since then, between 60 and 70 percent of physicians who emigrate have headed south of the border. In the mid-1990s, the number leaving for the U.S. spiked at about 400 to 500 a year. However, in recent years, this number has declined, with only 169 physicians leaving for the States in 2003; 138 in 2004; and 122 in each of 2005 and 2006. These numbers represent less than half a percent of all doctors working in Canada.

 

So when emigration “spiked,” 400-500 doctors were leaving Canada for the United States.  There are more than 800,000 physicians in the U.S. right now, so I’m skeptical that every doctor knows one of those emigres. But I’d especially like you to pay attention to the yellow line, which is the net loss of doctors to Canada.

 In 2003, net emigration became net immigration. Let me say that again. More doctors were moving into Canada than were moving out.

 So there’s no part of this meme that’s true. Not only are physicians not more dissatisfied practicing in Canada than in the Unites States, but more doctors are also moving into Canada to practice than leaving.

 Aaron Carroll is a pediatrician, health services researcher, and Associate Professor of Pediatrics at Indiana University School of Medicine. He blogs at The Incidental Economist and tweets via@aaronecarroll .

By Aaron Carroll  |  08:46 AM ET, 06/03