High immigration has no place in a modern economy
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Proponents of high immigration claim that it is necessary to alleviate purported labour shortages and an ageing population.
These arguments were always spurious: Australia has run one of the largest migration programs in the world this century, yet has suffered from persistent labour shortages.
In effect, Australia has played a game of migration ‘whack-a-mole’ this century – it has imported migrants to solve skills shortages in some areas (e.g., aged care) only to create shortages in others (e.g., construction workers).
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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.