[rswail]

The points system for immigration is intended to allow in people who will be economically productive. Not for specific companies. This applies in Australia as well.

That's the difference. The focus is on the community contribution, not a specific company's requirements.

In Australia we have the equivalent of H1B (457) visas that are "sponsored" by an employer. That's separate to individual immigration visas.

[mardifoufs]

It's either you can get picked by an employer outright or go through the point system. Still, the point system is very very heavily skewed towards the theoretical economic output you have so I'm not sure if it's about maximum community contribution, unless we only judge that contribution according to how much an immigrant will work. In that sense the immigrants are still accepted mostly because they are beneficial economically, so our main immigration policy really isn't centered on any "humane" principle.

I'm not saying that's a bad thing, my point was mostly that thinking of Canada as being less strict/picky/transactional with regards to how it treats it's immigrants is just classic Canadian soft self-delusion[1]. Even the US lottery system is wildly more "progressive", and opens opportunities that just wouldn't exist otherwise if you cant meet the more stringeant requirements most of the other Western countries require.

[1]. I mean 18 years ago my dad was about to get denied at the very end of the whole process because an x ray showed a small shadow in his lungs that could've meant he may have had tuberculosis at some point in his life (it thankfully turned out that he didn't) . That would've meant that my mother, my sister and I would've been just flat out dropped too. After years of waiting! Though I understand that the system needs to filter these things out, but imo there's still nothing humane about that, it's just a transaction