RBA: Mass immigration behind Australia’s unaffordable housing

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RBA Governor, Phil Lowe, has once again blamed Australia’s mass immigration policy for inflating housing values and making homes unaffordable:

So what does the governor worry about? He worries about opportunity and about inequality… And he worries that high house prices can entrench inequality from one generation to the next…

Hold on. Aren’t you to blame? Wasn’t it the RBA, by keeping interest rates so low for so long, that created the “bubble” in house prices? “It was a contributor,” Lowe concedes, “but not a prime contributor. If you ask any first-year economics student, what’s going to happen to housing prices – we all want to live in fantastic locations by the coast, each person have a large block of land, and under-invest in transport, and allow fast population growth, please explain? I think you’re going to get high housing prices.”

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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.