Squawk,
You are right my information is a few years dated regarding taxes, and they originate from BC. However, I have lived in Ontario as well, just not as recently. You are correct about the taxes in Ontario being reduced so drastically but at what cost? I was in Ontario last year on holiday and I seem to recall that teachers were working to rule after not having had a pay increase in something like 9 years. So that is actually a big pay reduction with inflation taken into account (albeit low levels). This meant that there are no extracurricular activities, ie sports, music, etc, with the exception of a small number of teachers who were defying the union. As a parent, I would not settle in Ontario for this very reason. Having said that I think things here in Britain are headed that way as well!! I would live nowhere else but in BC but that is a personal decision. I would rather pay the extra tax because the overall quality of life (in areas that I see as important for myself and my family) is far higher. But you do pay for that and admittedly you do have to put up with some pretty weird governments.
Flxsrsrwy,
Your price comparisons are not quite correct because you cannot compare prices like for like in that way. The cost of living in the UK is certainly not 2.5 times that in Canada, just because the exchange rate is in that region. BA pilots certainly do NOT live a quality of life similar to an regional pilot in Canada. Nowhere even remotely near. These guys are living well, let me tell you. As an FO for a UK charter airline I can tell you that I have the lifestyle of a newly qualified AC captain. A semi-detached house in London by the way costs nowhere near £100,000, more like £250,000 unless you are planning on living somewhere really really horrible, but most pilots do not live in London. If you are based at LGW or LHR then yes, your housing costs will be higher but you do not need to live in London - guys are spread all over the south of England. London is so radicially more expensive than the rest of the country it is just unreal. Cost of living in London probably is 2.5 times that in Toronto but the rest of the UK is nowhere near that level. You can buy a nice detached home with garden in the midlands for £80-90,000, and south of Birmingham for £120,000. But it depends so much on where you buy, some places are expensive because people want to live there and some aren't. You say $250,000 will buy a small mansion outside of Toronto, but how far outside? Last time I looked $250,000 will buy a modest sized house in Mississauga but nothing more. But Toronto, like London, has that effect on house prices. If you spent $250,000 on a place just outside of Edmonton you'd get acres of land and a mansion. Depends where you buy. And it all comes down to mortgageable pay anyway. The simple fact is that based on the wages I have seen, a 757 FO for C3 can afford (on a single wage) a house that costs around $150-180,000. In Britain, a similar FO for a similar airline can afford a house that costs £150-170,000. That is the equivalent of around $330-400,000. That works out to a lot more house in the UK.
It does not cost £10,000 for a mini. Car prices have been unrealistically high in this country for years but this year has seen prices fall by a lot due to government pressure. £10,000 will buy you a much more decent car these days and by the way, that includes the sales tax of 17.5%, which is never quoted on the price of products in Canada (ie GST, PST except Alberta). The price on an item is what you pay, you don't get about 15% added at the counter. That is why, on the face of it, things in Canada look so much cheaper and while on the whole things are cheaper, they are not as cheap as you would think.
Something that may come as a surprise is that in Canada the health system is free but prescription drugs cost a lot of money. In the UK, the standard prescription fee is £6 for absolutely anything. In Canada, you had better have a drug plan of some sort, either in your company benefits plan or out of your own pocket (at around 50 bucks a month I think) because drugs are expensive. The last prescription I had in Canada was for some simple antibiotics for a minor infection at a cost of $80!!! I cannot imagine what I would do if I had a serious problem with no drug plan. And as well Canada does not have a two tier health system like we do in the UK. My company pays for private medical care for me (a nice little benefit I must say) but in Canada, as someone mentioned earlier, you have to go to the states and be prepared to spend thousands upon thousands for private health care.
Even things like energy costs cannot be compared like for like. The cost of energy in this country is a lot higher than in Canada, but we use only a fraction of the energy to heat our houses and therefore I actually spend less than the average Canadian doing so. If we all used resources to the same extent that Canadians do than sure, this place would be unliveable in terms of cost but we do not, since the climate is not so harsh. I do get tired of all the rain though. Thought it rained a lot in BC but this place takes the cake.
So after all that (sorry about the length) I am just trying to say that UK cost of living is not what it seems. Yes we are ripped off for a lot of things but not as bad as people might think . Everyone always thinks they have a raw deal but having lived on both sides of the fence I can safely say that both countries are great for some things and not for others. But for an airline (jet) pilot in Canada to enjoy the same standard of living as an equivalent pilot in the UK, F/O starting wages would have to be in the neighbourhood of around $80,000 and captains would have to start on around $130,000. I personally would never move back unless I could secure a wage of at least that amount but more likely closer to $90,000 or my quality of life would be seriously diminished. Which is a shame because I love Canada. But I hate the way it treats pilots. I have 3000 hours, 2500 of which are on 757/767. Anyone in Canada want to hire me for $90,000 plus benefits to live in Vancouver? I doubt it. Instead I will be buying a house in Canada for my holidays, because with my pay I can afford that sort of thing.
Gearup, I wish you the best of luck at it appears that you have thought things through and have got things sorted out. So long as you either have a great job arranged with decent salary, or you have another source of income, then life will be good for you.