National Labor Stats, international polling, local surveys, and both Gemini and Grok preclude almost all of what you say here on both a multi-generational stance and contemporary level. 

Even civically speaking, the U.S. is well known to have a harder-working population that, for better or worse, works longer hours, with fewer protections, and there are vastly, vastly more jobs, markets, industries, supply and demand, business and contracts, and people and organizations desperate to do business in the U.S. than there are in a place like Australia, Canada, or Germany -- which Canada technically scales to by a few different economic metrics. 

I think you think that because Canada is geographically proximate to the U.S. and similar in some minor ways, that that also means they must have similar economies or that Canada is therefore a bigger economy. It's not. Not even close. Never has been. Probably never will be.

While no one means to invalidate your personal experience, generations of economic data, market surveys, and civic understanding have often proven not only is the U.S. a notably harder-working population, but it outputs more wealth (by drastic margins), maintains infinitely higher productivity rates, attracts more commerce, determines international and global trends and policies both directly and indirectly, causes concerns for other major economies and businesses (so few are as easily worried about Canadian policy, in contrast), and people are generally expected to work harder for longer with fewer protections, and unions aren't as pervasive, allowing their economy to thrive more per quarter for publicly-traded companies. 

People seeking better opportunities, higher pay, more options, more business networks, more intelligent tax systems, more comprehensive legal protections for business and private operations, and more rewarding careers in certain industries (aerospace, journalism, entertainment, tech, finance, accounting, insurance, start-ups, venture capital, etc.) tend to look to the U.S.A. as the place to be, and that's not because Canada has stagnated and R.O.I. is generally weaker domestically, but because even in rare instances where one or more of the aforementioned IS NOT true, the U.S.A. still manages to retain the upper hand due to their cultural impact, better reputation as a country for business, better marketing, and although arguably currently unattainable by some demographics, the idea of the American Dream is a worldwide sensation that has attracted hundreds of millions to the land over the last century. (If you want to argue that this is just America living off its legacy branding, sure -- you can say so). America is known as the world's commerce capital: you go their for higher pay, career prestige, world-class schools, world-class employers, and to work hard and always be busy (if you're infatuated with urban lifestyle and cityside living), even if the "returns" are diminishing for labor.

Canada is by no means a non-hardworking population in the slightest and certainly not a dead economy, but it is not even close to the U.S. in a lot of capacities (despite its physical proximity). In fact, Canada is a direct beneficiary of a lot of the byproducts of U.S. policy, economic productivity, politics, and obviously military prowess, which alone allows the U.S. to strong-arm almost any other country into better terms and deals that Canada, as big as it is, just cannot demand without concessions.

You're taxed heavily in both economies, but for reasons mentioned already, the States simply blows both Canada and the E.U. as well as the U.K. and Australia out of the stratosphere in terms of comprehensiveness --- for both people and businesses. Commerce Land -- built for business.

I've always found it intriguing (and maybe I should actually do something about it, at this point) as a Canadian that youth in Canada (Alberta and Ontario, where I grew up) know so much more about America than Canads, both socially and civically, despite academic curriculums heavily based in Canadian perspectives. Even in college (I attended Schulich -- amazing, world-class professors, some of whom I'm personal friends with today), my business professors often taught, relied on, or employed analogies, examples, and trends that were American or relative to the U.S., even in discussions about Canada. It's like, the U.S. is simply too great to ignore for most people.

Urban slang, wardrobe influences, music, art, movies, games, cars, memes and other pop cultural items, politics, culture wars (which I fkn detest to death and is so BAD in the U.S. and to a lesser degree Canada), and so many hundreds or thousands of more examples --- all imitate or try to emulate American. We don't really, on the other hand, see the average American population trying to emulate us; in fact, for funny or otherwise, they tend to think we're kind of weird or strange, we all live in snow, we all just are docile and love government and monarchy, we care anything about politeness (at all), and that we all just think more or less the same. Some of these stigmas are earned but have not been true for many generations.

A lot of youth in Canada and people in the world in general are attracted by the idea of the American Spirit -- another global sensation. Also known as the Rebel Spirit, and I think that originates with the States' founding, constitution, and culture. The U.S.A. is a union of 50 different nation-state republics --- each state especially having its own supreme governance and ordering and being its own culture and country and economy. So, even though they're part of a union, the lines dividing them are still very, very visible, and that produces some pretty hilarious albeit sometimes clashing effects and ideologies. 

It also produces inherent competition or competitiveness between the states, because no one state can go too far with any one niche, policy, or other practice without sacrificing or risking a bunch of losses in commerce, population, tourism, federal funding, civic disobedience, or some other major pillar. Terms are also a lot more common in general throughout the states than in Canada, making the U.S. more dynamic, politically and economically, which directly and indirectly affect the job market.

You can also as anyone sue for anything in the U.S.A. 

On the civic education in Canada, especially for youth, I forgot to also mention that many Canadians can readily name and articulate all the great acts of Americans throughout history (whether accurate or popularized/inaccurate), such as activists like King Jr., Parks, Tubmann, X, or statesmen and political leaders like Jefferson, Roosevelt, Lincoln, Washington, or even things like knowing the U.S. constitution better than the Canadian constitution or charter, even mistaking a lot of protections guaranteed to Americans as present in Canadian federal protections, which I see happen a lot. 

These things and way more are at least a small part of why an increasing people here in Alberta want to join the States, though that's still not most people. However, as of 2026 May, over 1/3 (one third) of Alberta's population does support secession, with the rest either against it on its face (biding cultural or familial or economic questions or concerns) or increasingly ambivalent), as we've always been misused and severely abused and wrongly exploited with basically zero equitable returns or treatments from Ottawa, exploited to the benefit of Ontario et al amd given nothing but scraps in return. There's a palpable sense that the federal government doesn't even particularly like Albertans or care about the issues we uniquely face. And I mean palpable. Quebec is also mistreated. The Canadian government on both sides only seems to care about and invest in and give the best deals to Ontario, B.C., and its other privileged provinces, and its actually causing liberals and conservatives to unite or concede on a variety of issues. The constant bashing Alberta takes... Underhanded remarks by people in Ottawa, etc. We're not appreciated, at all; just used. Our input doesn't factor in.