Confused government officials deny migrants have taken most jobs

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By Leith van Onselen

April’s joint Treasury/Department of Home Affairs propaganda report, Shaping a Nation, confirmed what many of us already knew: that most new jobs created have gone to migrants:

Recent migrants accounted for two-thirds (64.5 per cent) of the approximately 850,000 net jobs created in the past five years. For full-time employment, the impact is even more pronounced, with recent migrants accounting for 72.4 per cent of new jobs created.

Then in May at Senate Estimates, Assistant secretary in the Home Affairs statistics and information branch, Jason Russo, also confirmed that migrants have taken the majority of new jobs:

Assistant secretary in the Home Affairs statistics and information branch, Jason Russo, said it was likely that “more than 50%” of the 1 million jobs created in five years were a result of immigration.

Home affairs secretary Michael Pezzullo clarified that this was likely because immigration’s contribution to population growth in Australia was running higher than 50%…

In Estimates, officials could not definitively break down the number of permanent and temporary migrants that made up the total figure, but said that the 457 temporary skilled visa program accounted for around approximately 500,000 of the 850,000 of the jobs created in the time the report examined (which ended in 2016, well before the government reached 1 million jobs created).

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Now, officials from the Department of Jobs and Small Business are claiming that recent migrants are not taking jobs:

Of the 1.1 million jobs created in the past five years, 56,000 arrived in Australia during that period, a Senate estimates hearing has been told…

Departmental officials were unable to answer Labor frontbencher Doug Cameron’s question about how many were visa holders at a Senate estimates hearing in Canberra on Wednesday.

But it was indicated the number would be small with 56,000 of the 1.1 million people getting jobs arriving in Australia during the past five years.

Jobs deputy secretary Martin Hehir said the department was limited by the type of data collected by the Australian Bureau of Statistics

Senator Cameron was frustrated by the lack of clarity around visa holders.

“I think you guys are a bit confused, you’re certainly confusing me. Maybe you can get your act together and come back with some definitive answers,” the Labor veteran told the officials.

Liberal minister Linda Reynolds defended the public servants, saying the ABS showed over one million – or about 95 per cent – were “definitively” Australian.

According to the 2016 Census, 1.3 million of Australia’s 1.9 million population increase between 2011 and 2016 was from people born overseas (i.e. new migrants):

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So, are these officials claiming that nearly all of these migrants are unemployed? If so, what happened to the claim that Australia is running a ‘skilled’ migrant program that is plugging ‘critical skills shortages’?

What a farce.

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About the author
Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.