Monday, 19 November 2018

Where the demographic tsunami hits

Where the young migrants head

I've posted some research previously to show how Australia's population pyramid is benefiting from a starburst of 25-34 year-olds thanks to the country's immigration programme. 

This is visibly helping to slow the ageing of the Aussie population. 


Intuitively it's always seemed likely that the younger migrant cohort would gravitate to the University precincts and inner suburbs of the capital cities. 

But here's some startling research that shows just how different population pyramids are around the traps, by Demogog Blog's Simone Alexander.

The blog notes:

"As a global city, Sydney attracts a disproportionate share of Australia's migration intake, so when net overseas migration is high it tends to have a positive effect on Sydney's growth rate".

In Camden there are many families with young children, for example, out on the greenfield sites of the urban fringe. 

Meanwhile the south coast has many older inhabitants.

But the inner suburbs of Sydney are experiencing an explosion in the 25-34 year-old cohort, due to the prevailing powerful levels of net overseas migration.  

Despite there being fewer children as a share of the population in the inner city of Sydney, almost half of the population here is aged 20-34, due to the employment, education, and lifestyle opportunities. 

The ABS will release its latest population projections on Thursday this week, which is always useful to recalibrate a few expectations. 

Stay tuned for that.