Xiang Biao, an anthropologist at Oxford University, divides the stages of Chinese immigration overseas into " Early migration, early onset, early onset, early migration "The watershed between the two periods was 2010. Chinese people overseas all know that the goal of ordinary working-class people is to move early and arrive early; while big bosses like Pan Shiyi and Zhang Lei regard early departure and early departure as their goals. This was true before and after 2010, and it is also true at this moment in 2025. While the reasons for immigrating vary, the goal of establishing roots and prosperity abroad is the same. Whether it is worth emigrating depends entirely on your determination to take root overseas. Families who are half-hearted, worry about gains and losses, and want to eat from both ends of the sugar cane may end up returning home, because it is indeed not easy to start over.
Recently I saw someone asking on social media why so many Chinese Canadians choose real estate agents, insurance consultants, and financial and tax consultants after trying many industries? Let me answer this question here: Immigrating overseas has to go through three stages: 1. Landing; 2. Take root; 3. Abundance Among them, the third stage is the most difficult and takes the longest time. Therefore, investment-related services require overseas Chinese to inspire, help, and support each other. Only in this way can we work together to become rich together, so there are particularly many Chinese engaged in these related services.
01 landing
Immigrants to Canada don’t have to worry too much about integrating into society, because Canada established an inclusive national policy when Trudeau Sr. was in power, and various ethnic groups pieced together Canadian society like a mosaic. This is very different from the United States. The United States is a melting pot. No matter where you come from, you have to melt into the old America. When landing in Canada, you need to consider two important issues: 1. Which city you plan to live in; 2. Whether you want to study off-the-job.
Choosing which city to live in is as important as reincarnation, if you didn’t vote well the first time, you can’t make the wrong choice again in this second chance after immigrating to Canada. The city where new immigrants choose to live in the future is as important as the city where college graduates choose to work. A fresh graduate once asked a professor which city should he go to for a job. The professor said, look at the three cities with the highest housing prices in the country, and then choose one from them. I completely agree with the professor’s opinion. A person who is confident in himself, is not afraid of market competition, and hopes to make a difference should work in a city with the highest concentration of population and the most expensive cost of living. Such a city is where the brave should belong. Some cities in Canada are very friendly to new immigrants. For example, in some cities, the government provides living subsidies for new immigrants as long as they learn French. New immigrants need to set a time limit for themselves and cannot stay in the safety net of new immigrants for too long, otherwise they will become dependent and forget their original intention. Seeking relatives and friends is also a factor for new immigrants to choose a city to live in. Similarly, if the city where relatives and friends live lacks vitality and employment opportunities, they should not stay too long. New immigrants need to consider the opportunity cost of time during the landing stage. The longer they rely on government assistance and help from relatives and friends, the more delayed it is to become financially independent and start accumulating wealth, and the higher the cost of time is.
Whether or not to study off-the-job is a question that many new immigrants struggle with. From what I have observed, full-time study is an extremely expensive option. If you can gain real skills through off-the-job study, such as getting qualified as a lawyer or dentist, you can immediately gain productivity and become a respected professional. On the other hand, if you just want to get a diploma and cannot learn real skills, it is not worth studying off-the-job. For example, for someone who gets a bachelor's degree in computer science but does not know how to program, it is difficult to match the effort and reward. Canadian society values abilities rather than academic qualifications. Canadian diplomas are not a certification of Canada’s ability to survive. For new immigrants, if they were English teachers before and lost their skills after arriving in Canada, the best option is to learn a trade while working, such as bookkeepers, electricians, etc. If you work 4 years later, you will be 4 years later in buying a house. The opportunity cost will continue to rise due to rising housing prices. The total opportunity cost will be far greater than the economic cost. Many people feel that immigrating to Canada is not worth it because they cannot calculate the opportunity cost. In fact, this is caused by their own choices and has nothing to do with Canada.
02 take root
The necessary condition for taking root overseas is the determination to break the boat, and everything else is secondary. Cut off the possibility of returning to work in China and transfer all your assets to Canada, otherwise it will be difficult to make up your mind. I have seen many cases of reshoring, all because of the need, the need, the need, and the need. I have been struggling with it, it is difficult to make a choice, I cannot make decisive decisions, I have missed many opportunities, I have been unable to achieve my goal of immigrating, and in the end I have to give up taking root overseas.
The basis of modern society is the division of labor, because no one can live in a city on his own. Work means finding an irreplaceable position in the social division of labor, and the level of income is determined by irreplaceability. The first-generation immigrants have a very single way of survival. They usually wholesale their time and services and work for companies. In Canada, it is not easy to find a job, but it is not easy to find a job that can maintain a competitive advantage for a long time. Unemployment is a common occurrence in Canada. No one feels ashamed because of unemployment, but feels that it is a part of life. The key point for new immigrants to find a job is to start working and learn by doing.
The workplace is the most important soil for all salaried workers to take root in their new lives. Immigrants who find professional jobs are lucky and successful. By working hard and paying taxes honestly, skilled immigrants can easily gain the trust of banks and achieve excellent results in real estate investment. The function of the workplace, in addition to obtaining a stable income, also provides an opportunity for paid learning. Everyone in the workplace must realize that they are not only working for the boss, but also learning knowledge and accumulating experience for themselves. Advancement in the workplace may not necessarily mean entering a larger factory or company, but it may also be self-employment. Study for yourself and be ready at any time. Even if the grassroots team collapses, you can successfully make a career jump based on your ability or go it alone.
The self-employment industry is very worth doing, especially after encountering bottlenecks in the workplace. To engage in self-employment work in Canada, you need to face the market by yourself, bear your own risks, and be responsible for your own profits and losses. Self-employment can unleash a person's potential to the greatest extent, and at the same time, it can also magnify one's own weaknesses and flaws, thereby identifying deficiencies and continuously learning and improving. The biggest problem in the self-employed industry is that there are many salespeople who are learning and selling now. Yesterday they were salespeople in industry A. After taking a certificate, they become salespeople in industry B today. When consumers face practitioners in the self-employed industry, the biggest risk is that they are unable to identify who are truly trustworthy professionals with experience and professional ethics, and who are the sales representatives who are here. Consumers can align information gaps by looking at self-employed people’s social media histories. Before new immigrants choose to be self-employed, it is best to have relevant resume and working experience in the industry, because it is difficult to gain a foothold just by messing around and learning and selling.
Slash youth are actually people who work several temporary jobs at the same time. From the perspective of human division of labor and cooperation, if a person is involved in too many fields at the same time, he will be less able to master any field. It is not recommended that new immigrants take a lot of certificates and work in sales in several industries at the same time, because doing so goes against the most basic common sense of economics. In real life, we cannot find many successful slash young people.
How deep do you have to take root to be considered as having taken root overseas? I think, Borrowers deemed trustworthy by the credit system are considered to have taken root overseas. At a New Year's party, a friend who was less than 40 years old said that he owns 7 properties, each of which has a mortgage loan, and has opened two companies. Each company has obtained a commercial loan. His current situation is better than the most optimistic situation he imagined before immigrating. He feels that paying taxes and immigrating are worth it. Canada's savings rate is 7%, and China's savings rate is 43%. Canada's financial and credit system is sufficient to convert extremely low savings into capital to support economic development. This shows that Canada’s financial and credit system is very mature and efficient in identifying and judging the solvency of consumers and businesses. People who have not taken root have weak repayment capabilities and can only obtain short-term, high-interest loans. It is difficult to obtain long-term, low-interest mortgage loans and business loans.
03 Abundance
It’s not easy to take root, but it’s even harder to become rich. Everyone wants to lock in the fruits of their labor. It is best to use money to make money to consolidate and grow wealth, maintain purchasing power, and remain wealthy after retirement. Mises said that the only way for a person to obtain sustained income is to continue to provide products and services; Li Lu said that the essence of wealth is the proportion of purchasing power in the economy; I said that investment is to balance a lifetime of income. In short, investment is to maintain continuous income, to maintain the continuous supply of products and services, and to maintain the proportion of your purchasing power in the countries where you need to consume. Investment is everyone's lifelong job, and it is also the last job. Live until you are old and invest until you are old.
Any skill that can make money make money requires personal involvement, and practice is the most important learning method. We can't blame teachers and parents for not teaching the skills of making money, because they don't know how to do it. Many people look for shortcuts and agents when it comes to investment, but there are no shortcuts in investment, and no agent can be responsible for our own retirement life. Each of us is the sole captain of our own ark of wealth. All professionals are sailors. Relying on sailors to row the boat is irresponsible to ourselves. The real estate agents, insurance consultants, and financial and tax experts we usually come into contact with are all our sailors. There are a large number of sailors in the Chinese community. We can choose sailors we trust, but we cannot hand over the entire ship to the sailors. Professionals are indispensable when it comes to investment issues, but we ourselves need to grasp the direction, set goals, and overcome difficulties. Professionals provide limited services and guidance, not the final decision. The ability to control the overall situation completely requires our self-study, learning from practice and action, not just sitting back and talking. Self-study, keep teaching yourself; practice, keep practicing; give up taking shortcuts and relying on professionals; only in this way can you gain wealth and stay rich.
Trump's threat to annex Canada has inspired Canadians to think about whether they are really worse off than those in the United States. Americans have a life expectancy of 76.4 years, and Canadians have a life expectancy of 81.75 years. Judging from this indicator alone, Canadians do not want to become Americans. The proportion of Americans who die of despair is much higher than that in Canada. One of the reasons is that the United States does not have publicly funded medical care. Americans are deeply afraid of falling into poverty due to illness, but Canadians do not have this worry. Therefore, Americans may appear to have higher incomes, but after taking into account their own medical expenses or health insurance premiums, their actual incomes are not necessarily much higher than Canadians. Considering the risk of falling into poverty due to illness, Americans try to choose more liquid financial assets when investing, while Canadians can consider real estate physical investments that are illiquid but low-risk. According to Li Lu, "The essence of wealth is the proportion of purchasing power in the economy." Canada is a country of immigrants. Immigrants who have landed should start working and buying properties earlier than immigrants who are still on the way. Later people will buy properties from existing homeowners, and homeowners will automatically have the advantage of keeping the proportion of purchasing power from declining. Generation after generation of Canadians have chosen to put their wealth in real estate for good reason, because years of practice have proven that real estate investment is a very effective means of preserving and increasing the value of wealth. New immigrants who delay buying a house will feel huge pressure and need to constantly find reasons to convince themselves and their families why they haven't bought a house yet. Therefore, a group of bloggers who specialize in short-selling real estate have emerged on social media to satisfy this psychological need.
Although achieving wealth is not simple, it is not as difficult as imagined. You must first take the first two steps: landing and taking root, and then finding a wealth container suitable for Canada's local conditions. Put your eggs in one basket and be optimistic about this basket. If you are successful and your assets exceed 10 million Canadian dollars, then consider diversifying and diversifying investments. Don't listen to lectures that recommend diversified investments. These suggestions are only suitable for large asset owners and ordinary working-class people. There is no need to consider the issue of diversified investments. Listen less to tax saving advice. If you pay less tax, banks will not believe that you can afford the loan, so it will be difficult for you to be accepted by the credit system. You can't even take root, so how can you talk about being rich? Don't easily entrust someone else with your property, unless we are self-taught enough to recognize whether the person is an expert or a novice salesperson who is learning and selling. Stop complaining, seize opportunities, and act decisively. Canada is full of opportunities, but if your life is unsatisfactory and you have no wealth accumulation, the reason must be your own fault.
Conclusion:
Before 2019, China's economy experienced what Lin Yifu said was the late-mover advantage. The institutional dividend, demographic dividend, and urbanization dividend have been fully released. I mentioned this in the video "We are forced to invest in order to balance our lifetime income" Analysis has been done in the 6 lectures and my own suggestions have been put forward. After 2019, China's economy has encountered what Yang Xiaokai calls a late-mover disadvantageous stage. Going overseas is an option currently considered by entrepreneurs to avoid the tariff war. A few pioneers have begun to dismantle production lines and reassemble them overseas. An entrepreneurial version of early move and early launch is being brewed. Those who stay where they are will find that new and good jobs are quietly disappearing, and the involution is getting worse. Canada's immigration policy can be said to be erratic. Immigration policies in different periods are very different. If you plan to immigrate to Canada, you need to pay more attention to policy changes and seize the opportunity at the right time.
Huang Shengyi quoted a line from "The Shawshank Redemption" in the final issue of the fourth season of "Goodbye Lover": "Some birds must not be imprisoned. Their wings are too glorious. When they fly away, you will sincerely celebrate their freedom. Unfortunately, you have to continue to live in this boring place."
Only by flying away can you have a chance to find your rightful place. I wish those who have the courage to take off, have the courage to leave their comfort zone, and have the courage to let go, be able to be reborn, bloom, and have a prosperous life.
January 14, 2025 In Toronto