Albo and mates clearly believe in the myth of green growth. Things will go gangbusters as a Renewable Energy Superpower so we'll need lots more workers with plenty of money to go round. In 2022 he promised power bills will go down by $275 now people are getting $300 back from their own taxes.

If it turns out minimum wage workers can't afford electric cars let alone the existing electric power bill we'll be in strife when our 90% imported oil goes back to 2008 prices. Take two buses and a train to get to work then back an hour to affordable accommodation. Been there done that.

Another fiction Albo may believe in is that all the temporary visa holders want to return home after their stint here. That includes students, ag workers and aged care staff. No they want to stay then bring out relatives. We're locked into a spiral of steady impoverishment.

Thomas Sowell: “One of the big differences between economics and politics is that politicians are not forced to pay attention to future consequences that lie beyond the next election.”

“An elected official whose policies keep the public happy up through election day stands a good chance of being voted another term of office, even if those policies will have ruinous consequences in later years”.

If only there were fewer Paul1405's the Australian economy would thrive !

Depressing article, depressing subject!

Australia is on a race to the bottom with Lebanon, using Lebanese human assets to forge a new lawless order in the rolling new suburbs of our cities.
You think that is depressing, no, that’s true.

Next come the Palestinians. All of them persecuted and starved by Israel, (on script).
(Never mind), new recruits for the Hezbollah R&R camps, with catch up conversations on Hamas terrorist tactics over tea (amphetamines) and the Gllie, (my phonetics), trail into the fading light of Australian History and all under the unfurled Palestinian flags a flutter from front doors everywhere in sight. (No rainbow flags though, no,no,no)!

Further vision of rolling new social housing units added to the sprawl, also on script with Government propaganda from its prized media arm the ABC, highlighting further the huge successes of peace and bliss as product from the astounding social and cultural benefits of Multiculturalism. (Any missed opportunity to get aboard spraying out the astounding joys of an homogeneous Australia, will be filtered of White Colonialism content through the alternative SBS, before reaching the burning ears of the obedient masses).

Social housing will be (as currently is), reserved for these deserving MENA refugees and other immigrant sundry; (to the exclusion of Whites, who may live on the same streets in tents, till moved on by Authorities less friendly), a new social group recently legitimised by our dear old leader Joe O’Biden of the Democrats, a proud sponsor of rainbow Politics and supreme antithesis of White Culture; Alhamdulillah!

And therein folks, is the Australian immigration policy in a nut shell, in lock step with our greatest Allie and mentor, the last bastion of Democracy , bend a knee to the U-Sofa, and all praise to those lucky enough to have a roof over their undeserving White head!

Here we go again OLO brings out one of its "big guns" to attack Labor! This time its the Liberal party apoligiest, and former "Consultant", the know all, know nothing Stephen Saunders. A bit rich describing Jim Chalmers as "hapless" when I can find not a single useful contribution to bettering Australia by Mr Saunders. Oh yes, this old bloke was once a high paid a public servant, with his snout in the taxpayer trough. I suppose he has got to get out there and attack Labor, as there's noway that anyone could articulate Noalition policy.... they simply don't have any!

No-one's attacking Labor, drawing attention to Labor's ineptitude is Labor's doing !

As long as there's no Flat Tax, budgets are a mere deflection of fiscal mismanagement & corruption !

Me a "big gun", Paul? Hilarious. Far-fetched. Lying Jim's 1m migration driving too many Australians into homelessness? Cruel. Treacherous.

Steve, here is an opportunity for you to extol the virtues of Dud Dutton's housing shortage fix, as he put it in his budget reply. Please explain how cutting much needed skilled migrants is going to boost the Australian economy, and fix the housing shortage at the same time. While you're at it, could you give us a run down on that other bit of Noalition madness, another wonder policy, nuclear power generation.

There are certainly benefits to having some immigration. The question is how much. According to the ABS we were growing at 2.5% for the year ending in September 2023, nearly 660,000 additional people, overwhelmingly from immigration. Our own fertility rate has been below replacement level since 1976. Even if Albanese really does cut immigration in half, it is still far too high.

http://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/population

If continued, this implies a 27.7 year population doubling time. Idiot is too kind a word for anyone who thinks that either population or consumption can grow without limit on a finite Earth or within the borders of a finite country.

It is easy to see why the politicians' big business mates want this sort of growth. (1) They get a bigger aggregate economy creating more wealth to siphon up to the top. The bulk of the population don't benefit. The pie is bigger, but it has to be shared with more people, so the average person's slice stays the same, may even be shrinking, and no longer has a cherry on top. We have been in a per capita recession for the last 4 quarters. (2) The population growth creates immense demand for housing, infrastructure, and public services, well beyond our ability to provide it, helping to drive up house prices and rents, so that the investors and property developers can squeeze middle and working class people dry on the cost of a necessity of life. (3) The population growth keeps competition for jobs high and wages low. The business elite get a cheap, compliant work force that has already been raised and trained at someone else's expense.
Look at profits versus labour share of the economy since 1975.

http://theconversation.com/underlying-australias-inflation-problem-is-a-historic-shift-of-income-from-workers-to-corporate-profits-200700

The extra pressure on the environment is a whole other story.

I hope that Steven Saunders will go on telling the truth.

The article is a mash of talking points that are written to confuse and mask the fact that there is no credible support for the claims made?

Further the author is with Tanton Network linked Sustainable Population Australia (in turn linked to Birrell & Betts' TAPRI), not exactly a font of humanity, multiculturalism or non skips? Tanton Network, inc TSCP, misrepresent data, demography and science, using techniques with Koch Network's climate science denial*.

https://population.org.au/stephen-saunders/

Further, he has published via the Zero Hedge (pro-Russian) inspired MacroBusiness, that cut and pastes RW 'libertarian' Mont Pelerin or Austrian/Chicago School (see Atlas - Koch Network), all to wedge and denigrate the centre e.g. ALP govt.; agitprop masquerading as media content for further distribution to RW MSM and influencers online.

*Focus on short term 'data noise' of high temporary border movements via NOM i.e. like the weather, but ignore long term demographic decline i.e. like increasing temperatures; too easy.

What does the writer ignore? First a permanent migration cap, then 7+ million boomers and oldies transitioning to, through and past retirement till mid century, with increasing old age dependency ratios; NOM churn esp. students etc., are 'free' money paying GST etc. to support more oldies.

Alternative? Increase taxes and decrease service delivery including health care, pensions etc. and lower or drop investment in infrastructure and related services.

Example of corrupt white Christian nationalist faux 'free market trap' that Koch & Tanton Networks which 'own' the GOP, Tories & LNP, in US with 'Christianists' in between, while Murdoch's Fox News leads on messaging, comms and PR for the same (in fact employed a friend of Tanton's).

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/if-you-are-business-fox-news-you-are-hook-its-white-nationalism

The NOALITION's centre piece of reducing migration is in a state of confusion, with Dud Dutton plucking a figure of 40% out of the air, only to have that countermanded by his shadow treasurer Doppy Taylor claiming nah its only 25%. Similar with the NOALITION nuclear power "policy" totally shambolic, they can't say how much it would cost, or where or when these power plants would be built. AND they want to run the country, Me thinks not!

Paul,

I trust the Coalition politicians about as far as I could throw them, but Albo has form for lying to us. Compare what he was saying before the election on immigration compared with what he did right afterwards.

http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2024/05/open-borders-albo-is-addicted-to-immigration/

We need to smash the duopoly and break the nexus between our politicians and corporate money.

Andras,

I suggest that you go and tell some of the people living in tents or in their cars that their greatest problem is John Tanton, an American who was born in 1934. I really don't care if John Tanton was a dyed-in-the-wool racist or just an old man who shared prejudices common in his generation. You have to keep harking back to him because you can't point to any racist words or deeds of the people opposing excessively high population growth now. Personally, I don't care if the migrants are black, brown, white, or green with purple polka dots. There are too many of them for the good of the existing population and of Australia's environment.

Nor can they solve issues to do with aging. Migrants grow old, too, just like everyone else. You apparently just want to create an even bigger problem in 40 or 50 years. Every country is just going to have to get used to a stable age structure. According to Jane O'Sullivan, the infrastructure and other costs of blowing out the population will actually be greater than the cost of coping with more elderly. Stop talking your book.

Divergence, why don't you access credible research vs. RW media anecdotes supporting its own white nativism and xenophobia?

Nor is it helpful to misrepresent data (like climate science deniers do) i.e. most of these 'immigrants' are temporary residents under the NOM and will not grow old in Oz, that's why they are 'net financial contributors'.

Possibly Australia's best demographer, with a global reputation not just Murdoch and RW media as another has, Hon. Prof. Peter McDonald, has good expert analysis in The Conversation:

'Peter Dutton wants to cut migration for the sake of housing. Here’s why that’s not a good idea...

...It is not well understood that almost all this net movement (90%) related to temporary residents, not permanent residents. This is important because temporary residents differ in many ways from permanent residents....

....They are not eligible for most government services including Medicare, the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme, the National Disability Insurance Scheme, state education, domestic tertiary fees and many more. Temporary residents do not buy houses.

While temporary residents are in the housing rental market, most are mainly in dedicated student or backpacker housing, or live with a higher number of people per dwelling than the permanent population.'

https://theconversation.com/peter-dutton-wants-to-cut-migration-for-the-sake-of-housing-heres-why-thats-not-a-good-idea-230298

Most temporary migrants do go home from some visa categories, but once the rest have spent a few years in Australia, they tend to put down roots and change from visa to visa to stay on by hook or by crook. See the graphs in

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-05-25/migration-heating-up-but-what-will-come-of-it/103889464

No one is going to make someone who has spent years in Australia leave after he is old and sick. As the saying goes, "There is nothing so permanent as a temporary migrant."

It varies from place to place, but I have read that about 20% of international students are in dedicated student accommodation. The rest are mostly competing with the locals in the private rental market. The universities are squawking because the government is demanding that they build more student accommodation if they want more international students.

http://www.law.unsw.edu.au/sites/default/files/imce/files/UNSW0006-No-Place-Like-Home_Executive-Summary.pdf

Which Peter McDonald?

http://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2024/05/flip-flopper-peter-mcdonald-spins-more-immigration-lies/

Macrobusiness tends to convict people out of their own mouths. It is interesting that no one has tried to sue them. Nor are they especially right wing or interested in race, religion, or ethnicity, although some of the commenters are. They were savage about the last Coalition government. It is just that the Right is now prepared to give them a hearing, unlike the Left.

Divergence: I take it that you have shares in MB :)

Like MB you denigrate Australian demographer McDonald who has a global reputation, matched by whom locally?

Like MB you offer no clear or direct analysis, just opinion masquerading as correlations; permanent migration is capped at 190k p.a., temps outside of this depart after contributing to Australia.

Andras.

No financial interest in MB or membership in any of their funds. MB was presenting government statistics and quoting Peter McDonald's own words. How is that defaming him? Try reading Bob Birrell or Katherine Betts, not just the demographers who will tell you what you want to hear.

See the graphs from the ABC that I linked to above about all the temporary migrants who change from visa to visa and do not leave. Believe it or not, the population cannot go on growing forever. We nearly ran out of water in the last drought and had very severe water restrictions. There are a lot more people in Australia now, and all of them need water. If we want to stabilize the population so we have some environment and quality of life left, we need around 70,000 net migration, as advocated by the Sustainable Australia Party, perhaps 90,000 in all to account for the citizens and permanent residents who leave, not 190,000.

Bob 'Australia's best demographer' Birrell and Katherine 'Camp of the Saints' Betts who have both contributed to the journal of dec. white nationalist John 'passive eugenics' Tanton?

He was anti-semitic, anti-Catholic, Islamophobic etc., admired white Oz policy, visited and was hosted by Sustainable Population Australia; the muse of Steve Bannon, Nigel Farage and FoxNews editorial (via chum Peter Brimelow of infamous VDare fame).

https://www.mediamatters.org/fox-news/if-you-are-business-fox-news-you-are-hook-its-white-nationalism

Tanton's informed TSCP The Social Contract Press, uses the same -ve climate science denial and faux analysis techniques applied to 'the other' via demography for right wing media headlines & talking points, was described by SPLC as:

'routinely publishes race-baiting articles penned by white nationalists. The press is a program of U.S. Inc, the foundation created by John Tanton, the racist founder and principal ideologue of the modern nativist movement. TSCP puts an academic veneer of legitimacy over what are essentially racist arguments about the inferiority of today's immigrants.'

https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/group/social-contract-press

Please point to anything that Bob Birrell or Katherine Betts themselves have written that refers to race in any way (not guilt by association).The Southern Poverty Law Center has form for smearing political opponents as racists or hate groups. See (and this is not the only lawsuit)

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-southern-poverty-law-center-has-lost-all-credibility/2018/06/21/22ab7d60-756d-11e8-9780-b1dd6a09b549_story.html

I am no fan of racism. I think that it is needlessly hurtful to individuals, wastes talent, and stirs up animosity between groups of people. All the same, it is far less serious compared to immiserating your people (such as by forcing large numbers of them to live in tents or their cars), causing a mass extinction, or otherwise trashing your environment.