I certainly brain-drained myself out of the US because moving to Canada was far far easier than trying to move myself to the US. I could afford to start the process, sure - and hire a lawyer to make things go smoothly... but instead I spent a total of about $500 and just self-filed some paperwork and I'm now a Canadian citizen. And, at the end of the day, I'm much happier with my current citizenship because the far reduced healthcare risk exposure and egalitarian working conditions are just much nicer to live in - there's still a significant wealth gap but wealth at least isn't glorified up here.
Tech salaries in Canada are in line with other highly paid professionals - I make as much up here as a lawyer... it is true that I'm not looking at the 600k+options job postings you'd see in the SF bubble but I certainly make enough that daily costs aren't a stressor.
Canada is probably about due for a major wage correction though - the PSAC strikes are a pretty good indicator that it's time to either seriously consider 32/hr weeks or starting to claw back corporate excess... that's sort of an international issue though.
Tech salaries in Canada are similar to tech salaries in US backwaters. My hypothesis is that the primary reason is there is some virtuous cycle of access to capital bringing more tech workers to California which cause more tech companies to be created, which suck in more workers from elsewhere, which increase capital availability and the number of new companies created. If immigration policy reduces the amount of workers that can be pulled in too severely, this will slowly grind to a halt.
