Too many Indian international students are living in unsuitable housing
Every single relevant force is lined up against them to bleed their pockets and bursaries dry
Infographic by Suneet Gill.
It is no surprise to any Kwantlen Polytechnic University student that international students are a part of our regular campus lives.
They are here for the same reasons as any other international student at any other university — to seek an education that professionally establishes them here, back home, or wherever else they believe they can settle and take root.
Being half a world away from home is a rough and risky road to traverse, and wolves are always prowling by the wayside, waiting for an opportunity to satisfy their predatory desires.
There are a variety of underhanded and exploitative methods that certain parties utilize to make quick bucks at international students’ expense. Whether it be fake admission letters or employer wage theft, thieves and fraudsters are always willing to manipulate human lives for their personal enrichment.
One such scam is a rip-off that is currently being levied on 33 per cent of Canadians and 54 per cent of Vancouverites — rent. While the wider topic is another broadside altogether, the focus right now is the quality of said rental units that Indian international students are subjected to.
In Brampton, Ont., and Surrey, Statistics Canada found more than 60 per cent of international students were living in unsuitable housing. In contrast, only 16.6 per cent of Canadian-born students in Surrey lived in unsuitable housing.
The National Occupancy Standard sets non-binding guidelines as to what counts as “suitable” housing. For Indian international students, the primary concern seems to be overcrowding due to insufficient number of bedrooms in the substandard dwellings they end up in.
The connection with rent is simple — international students rarely have the means to buy a home right away, and while rooming with family, friends, and/or acquaintances can be a workaround, it is not always a long-term solution.
Thus, the search for a place of one’s own begins and leads to disappointment. The current housing market is unsustainable thanks to the forces of commodification and speculation trying, once again, to extract infinite financial growth out of a finite “resource” — shelter should not be a resource that people and corporations invest in.
Pointing the finger at the growing number of international students and immigrants as being the sole or main cause of the housing strain is a reductive, xenophobia-tinged take that does nothing to solve the problem and lets off the market forces that are truly responsible.
Do we really need to relearn that investors, financiers, and the like will always look for quick and easy shortcuts to profit, even if it means jamming too many people into too small of a space? Classic slumlord behaviour.
International students keep having it rough in this country — misblamed for the housing market leading to a two-year pause, housing crises putting them into unsuitable housing, mental distress rates on the rise, wage theft, admissions scams, and needing increased working-hour caps to afford high tuition.
The whole system is being used to squeeze them for everything they have and it is still not enough for those roadside wolves operating in the light of day. Ultimately, this is a situation where almost everybody is missing the forest for the trees. An entire industry is being made out of international and domestic students with the former being designated as the convenient scapegoats wherever applicable.
Social scavengers become resilient entrepreneurs, while the innocent bystanders are thought to deserve their circumstances due to not being as “smart” or “resourceful” as their exploiters. These bystanders may fantasize about one day becoming the exploiters themselves, but this day will never come, so the vicarious experience will do.
