Report: Australia's Deaths to Outnumber Births by 2060s

Is skilled migration the sensible fix for Australia's aging population or a con that erodes living standards?

Published SEP 21

Report: Australia's Deaths to Outnumber Births by 2060s

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Above: Australian Treasurer Jim Chalmers arrives at Parliament House in Canberra, Australia, on Aug. 12. Image credit: Hilary Wardhaugh/Getty Images

The Spin

Left narrative

Australia's slower population growth and aging are real challenges, and skilled migration is the sensible answer. Migrants arrive younger and highly educated; they slow workforce aging and lift wages, patents and productivity in the regions where they settle. Banning them would shrink the economy, blow out deficits and leave regional health care and aged care without workers.

Australian Treasury Australian Treasury

Right narrative

Mass migration is a con dressed up as demographic policy. It props up a headline GDP number while GDP per person goes backward, and everyday Australians pay for it through expensive housing, congestion and stagnant living standards. Temporary visas should be cut and a strict cap put in place, so prosperity can be built the way Poland has, without importing a population the size of Adelaide.

Pauline Hanson's One Nation Party The Spectator Australia