The AFR View has taken a shot at critics of a ‘Big Australia’ (yours truly). Below are the The AFR’s key arguments alongside my rebuttal:
Critics of a “big Australia” tend to dismiss such calls to reboot the nation’s immigration program as quickly as possible as simply returning to some population Ponzi scheme that benefits property developers without any boost to national prosperity or per capita income. Yet population and property have played a critical role in the national prosperity created in the seven decades since The Australian Financial Review was launched in 1951. The fundamental driver of this prosperity has been the shift from an economy based on exporting wool and wheat to Britain, to selling iron ore, coal and gas to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and China. That has provided the national income that has attracted enterprising people from around the world to help build the homes, offices and shopping centres for a population that has expanded from 8 million in 1951 to nearly 26 million today…
Here’s a genuine question for The AFR: how has the shift “to selling iron ore, coal and gas to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and China” been achieved via immigration?
