Read the general life across the border overview
Hypothetical example: the Beausoleil-Ngata household is leaving Ramara on an intracompany transfer. Serge is the principal and his employer's petition covers him. Adaeze, his wife, is a Canadian citizen and a licensed veterinarian who intends to keep practising. Their daughter is nineteen and beginning a degree; their son is fifteen. That is four people and four different answers, and only the first of them is settled by the transfer itself.
The spouse has two options and they are not equivalent
As an L-2 spouse Adaeze would be employment authorized incident to status, needing no separate permit and free to take a position, including one she creates herself. That right is derivative and ends when Serge's status ends. The alternative is her own status: Veterinarian is a USMCA Appendix 2 profession with its own qualification rule requiring the professional degree or the relevant licence, so with her own American offer she could hold TN independently, which would survive whatever happens to his petition. The trade is real rather than theoretical. TN prohibits self-employment in the United States, so opening her own practice is not available under it, whereas the derivative authorization carries no such restriction. Which option is better depends on whether she wants security or wants to own something.
Children may study and may not work, at any age
Both children could attend school in dependent status, from elementary through university, and neither could take paid work of any kind, including a summer job for a neighbour. This surprises families more than any other rule here. The nineteen-year-old raises a second issue with a date attached: derivative status for a child ends at twenty-one, and hers will end in the middle of a degree. Statutory child status protection addresses delays in immigrant petitions and does not extend a nonimmigrant dependant's eligibility, so the answer is to plan her own route well ahead, most often a student classification requiring admission, funding and a timely application. Beginning that in the final months is how families end up with a gap in status.
The distinctions that get blurred at kitchen tables
Three of them cause most of the confusion. Canadian permanent residence is not Canadian citizenship, and only citizenship opens the professional route under the treaty, so a household in which one adult is a citizen and another is a permanent resident has two different sets of options and should map them separately. American permanent residence is not American citizenship either, and naturalization is a later process with its own requirements. And a common-law partner, however long the relationship, is not a spouse for derivative purposes under these categories and needs an independent route. The governing principle is simple to state and easy to forget: each person's own citizenship, age and intended activity decide their status, not the household's plan.
What else is on your mind?
Is a matching job title enough for TN?Can years of experience replace a degree for TN?Can my own U.S. company employ me under TN?Can my spouse work if I hold TN status?Editorial source review: 2026-09-07. General preparation guidance, not an individual assessment.