Thursday, 19 September 2024

Population growth passes the peak

Rapid population growth

Over the year to March 2024, Queensland saw net inbound interstate migration of +31,000 (the inverse of the net -31,000 outbound interstate migration from New South Wales).

It looks like the interstate exodus has moderated towards historic norms now, which makes sense at this point in the cycle.

Net interstate migration for Victoria has, meanwhile, turned slightly positive, as some of the pandemic refugees return home, while Western Australia mopped up the rest of the interstate movers over the year to March.


Net overseas migration was a huge +510,000 over the year, still about +18,000 higher than a year earlier.


These are obviously still extremely high numbers...but it does at least look as though the peak of population growth has now passed. 

Over the year to March, the estimated resident population increased by +619,000, down from the record annual growth of +667,000 six months earlier. 


This slight slowdown clipped about -40,000 from the Aussie population clock, and puts the estimated resident population today at around 27.4 million.


Totting this all up equates to enormous annual population growth for New South Wales (+167,700), Victoria (+184,000), and Queensland (+135,00), while Western Australia's population growth rate was a ferocious +3.1 per cent.

On the way down from here, then, but still rather too high for comfort from the government's perspective.