Advertisement
Proponents of high immigration claim that it is necessary to alleviate purported labour shortages.
The argument was 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’ – 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).
Advertisement
The full text of this article is available to MacroBusiness subscribers
Cancel at any time through our billing provider, Stripe
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.