Population growth from migration is continuing at record levels, with a net gain of 71,885 in the 12 months to April, a record for that 12 month period, according to Statistics NZ.
That compares with a net gain of 68,110 in the 12 months to April 2016, 56,813 in the 12 months to April 2015, 34,366 in the 12 months to April 2014, and just 4776 in the 12 months to April 2013.
That means population growth from migration has more than doubled in the last three years and is 15 times higher than it was four years ago.
However there is a tentative sign that the growth of recent years may have peaked, with a net gain of 3406 in the month of April, slightly down from the net gain of 3453 in April last year.
April is usually one of the slowest months for migration, with the bottom of the cycle usually occurring around May, before numbers start rising again in the second half of the year.
The high net gain figure came from 129,779 people who arrived in the country on a long term basis in the year to April, which was a record for that period, while 57,894 people departed these shores permanently or long term, giving a net gain of 71,885.
The biggest source countries were China and Hong Kong with a net gain of 11,060 in the 12 months to April, followed by India 7792, the UK 6439, South Africa 4749, and the Philippines 4532.
And more New Zealanders are leaving the country permanently or long term than are arriving back, with a net loss of 1406 New Zealand citizens in the 12 months to April and a net gain of 73,209 citizens form other countries.
Of the 129,779 people in total who arrived in this country permanently or long term in the 12 months to April, 43,991 were on work visas, 38,099 were NZ or Australian citizens, 23,869 were on student visas (which will usually also allow them to work in this country), and 16,678 were on residency visas (which would also usually allow them to work here).
Auckland remains the biggest destination for migrants by a substantial margin, with 74% of those who stated where they would be living in this country saying it would be Auckland.
That means Auckland's population probably increased by about 50,000 over the 12 months months to April, purely from net migration, and that figure does not take into account any growth from people moving to Auckland from other parts of the country or the natural increase in population that occurs from births exceeding deaths.
That will put further strain on resources such as housing, transport and other infrastructure in the region, which are already under significant stress.
Net long term migration
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109 Comments
Raising residency income limits and crackdown on dodgy tertiary education institutes has brought down net migration from India by a whooping 37% year-on-year. Similar effects are evident on net migration from China, the numbers having flat-lined. The current setup allows a student to stay in NZ for up to 4-5 years from the point of first arrival for a one year course which mean the long-term migration may have peaked and could start falling by late next year.
Are the numbers peaking? - doesnt look like it
If immigration from India has fallen by a massive 37% due to changes by INZ and impacts on PTE's then the numbers are being made up from other sources in which case had it not been for the changes made the current numbers would be a lot higher, in which case I cant see a case for claims of peaking
... I'm sure that if I was a recently inducted citizen , courtesy of the backdoor " education " industry ... I would vote for the current government as thanks for being so stupidly generous to me ... and I'd want them to stay in power long enough for me to bring my entire extended family into NZ to enjoy the existing way of life .... which others ( but not me ) have paid for ... so I'd keep voting for them ...
Wild Bill English is onto a winner !
@ independant observever. That was what Bill English claimed but when the figures were checked with Work and Income it turned out that only one person in two hundred was failing the drug tests. New Zealands 90,000 unemployed youth have been thrown under the bus in favor of employers hiring trained immigrants instead of training young people. It saves the employer money but what is the true cost to NZ and our young people???
I take it you have never had thousands of dollars sitting on a tree needing picking and all going to waste because you couldn't get pickers.....export income lost to NZ because you couldn't get pickers......taxable income lost because you couldn't get pickers.......yes madness comes in many forms.
If the government didn't take in excess of 50% of people's incomes of them then we would be talking a different story.......if the government didn't raise the overheads costs continually and we both know that when you have one crop of something on an annual basis and the overhead costs are put up due to government through the year that budgets go completely awry.......and everyone's making cuts where they can then love comes under pressure...........any industry where you are a price taker is going to be tough, throw in the weather, currency pressures, weather, disease etc.......how many employees have to worry about these issues? They just have to decide if they can do the work and if the accept the pay rate on offer.
Maybe it would be simpler if you could bring in your own boatload of workers, provide them with basic onsite shelter, food and water, work them from dawn to dusk. Chuck up a couple of floodlights and you could have a night shift going as well. Wouldn't that be more efficient and productive.
Maybe a lobby group could be set up with people in a similar position. Surely the legislation could be created to allow this. All that export income, taxable income, less paperwork and red tape. The govt. could eliminate a whole department as well.
The principles of what you have outlined Meh are exactly what the politicians and bureaucrats expect from productive NZ......if it's good enough for the goose well you know the rest.......show me a farmer or orchadist or other who is not working dawn to dusk? Some have pretty good onsite shelter, food and water and it is nothing to sit on a tractor half the night to finish harvesting or other.....it is called the real world the one that many people in the cities and even some rural communitieshave no idea about......
Madness notaneconomist ? The mad thing as I see it is building an industry that relied on slave conditions, low wages that only desperate people from third world will accept, and relied on a population Ponzi that unloaded the real costs - eg infrastructure, environment - onto New Zealanders.
Really nuts expecting that rort to continue.
It is all very well to say that is madness KH, but what the heck were the non-players doing then? If it was so easy why didn't others develop other types of high paying industries?
The real Ponzi is in Wellington.......it unloads its costs on the productive? And it just keeps getting bigger and bigger.......which takes more and more people to contribute. A mathematical certainty that will lead to failure.
We already allow many people from Pacific Islands in to do this seasonal work and I firmly believe that if we made this part of the aid package we give to Pacific Islands it could greatly benefit everyone. It would need to be administered far more fairly than it is now, as for much of it, it is just a scheme for a few to rort the hell out of these people. By doing this and regarding as a part of an aid package we could probably allow far more people in for this seasonal work. They are our neighbours, we do have some obligations toward them.
I totally agree PocketAces. The pacific temporary workers are a win win.
We also give $50million a year to Indonesia. That money should at least be used to purchase some of their rainforest to protect it from the palm oil industry that our farming industry supports.
If the public healthcare system is bursting at the seams then why on earth are facilites and services not operative around the clock? The services are busy during the day but then "most" areas either shut down, move to skeleton services/staff etc......personally I see billions of dollars in bricks, mortar and equipment sitting around doing nothing for long periods in a 24 hour day......the public services have ended up emulating the gentleman clubs.
Do you know the overhead factor that has to get added to business goods and services to cover the cost of the health system, education system and other bureaucratic spending?
State services are not an investment but rather a cost to the productive sector whose participants mainly have private suppliers for their needs. People who immigrate here are adding to the tax base so are contributing already........any investment in health services needs to be in efficiency and utilisation of existing resources. For the billions that get pumped in the return is poor. And we have now created a 2 tier healthcare system.....public and private with the latter encompassing many of the alternative and/or holistic approaches available.
The after-hour system runs on a skeleton crew as most health professionals are already working near 80 hour weeks and cannot physically work longer hours without totally burning out. If there was further money invested into healthcare it would be possible to hire more staff to address this issue, however seeing as funding has not kept up with the increasing burden of elderly or population growth (largely driven by immigration) this cannot happen.
To clarify another point, for the money we invest our health outcomes are actually very good (see OECD stats here). Have a look at the graph on page 4 to see where we were standing, compared to the 'private healthcare' utopia of the USA we have superior outcomes for much less spending. The fact you're unaware of just how well our system runs on a shoe-string suggests your view is unlikely to be factual and reads more like ideological drivel.
It is going to come back to bite us imo. . Especially as some of these people are not coming from the healthiest countries and are also countries that can have lower life expectancy.
I have to wonder who is making the decision to open the flood gates. Whenever politician get questioned about this, they seem to imply that the high number is due to nzers moving back to nz from overseas. But if that is the case, then surely they should therefore limit the numbers of non residents coming in.
notaneconomist,
State services are not an investment but rather a cost to the productive sector. Are you really saying that education,healthcare,infrastructure,the fire service,social services,etc are not investments,but just a 'drag' on those who produce stuff?
I rather hope not,as it woulkd indicate both a lack of humanity,as well as common sense.
There isn't a single piece of economic analysis that I've read that indicates the benefits exceed the costs. In fact most economic analyses seem to support this high level of immigration based on benefits in terms of social diversity - and largely ignore the cost of growth/congestion (i.e., productivity) issues.
If social diversity is really the aim - then we ought to have a country-of-origin based immigration system - assigning quotas perhaps on a region/continent sort of basis.
Ah Kate often when one reads all those reports and look at the inputs of information there is often significant detail that was ommitted.....
I guess some of us have had many years to adjust to all the immigration here so perhaps are further down the acceptance track than more recent arrivals.
Not true - under capitalization in NZ makes us struggle to compete with overseas, and retain NZ graduates.
15 million was banded about as where we need to be heading too.
Anyway why are you complaining - I gave you and your son a heads up on what PN prices were going to do - he's probably 50k richer now, if you weren't so cynical you could have bought a dozen and be up a mill a yourself. Play the hand your deal and within the rules of the game - stop complaining and trying to change the rules, property will never be debased like fiat money is so add a conservative 2-3% capital growth onto your 7% yields in Palmy and it's a no brainer. Make the rentals warm, put in heat pumps, provide a valuable service for the transient population there
As more and more countries are shutting door to foreigners (including kiwi), NZ citizen and people with indefinite return visa will have to come back to NZ for whatever reasons. I personally know quite a lot of non-nz citizen with PR status went overseas after the initial 2 years of residence. They can land on NZ shore anytime and bring their partner and children without any restriction and claim all available social security just as all kiwis have not been absent from this country. They don't have to reside in NZ or in job or pay any tax to keep the permanent resident status. Any other major comparative country (Aus, Canada, UK, US) has similar indefinite visa in 21st century? None. Any party in NZ can touch this fundamental issue? NONE
Hi Rick. From what I can work out the NZ Initiative are a think tank of immigrant property investors who have landed in the land of milk and honey and can't believe how stupid we are. They pump the population growth mantra to keep the property ponzi scheme going and have no long term stake in NZ or long term care of the outcome as long as they get rich, which they are. Our media soak up their propaganda as though they are quoting worthy economists.
You’re truly surprised? The government is simply doing what its supporters have demanded and continue to demand. Business and agriculture want radically reduced employee costs and expanded activity. Bankers want to lend. Home-owners, so every focus group asserts, like rising house prices. Investors and their bankers depend on them.
Immigration is the government’s policy answer. It is the government’s one, single and only big idea, its reason-for-being. At one end, chosen immigrants drive labour and professional costs to the floor, and at the other they promote new economic activity.
Short-term thinking? To an extreme. But many in business and agriculture work to a whole 12-month timeframe and the government’s view stretches way out there to three years. So the situation won’t change until either (1) it completely breaks the nation’s ability to cope or (2) the voting population absolutely demands longer-term thinking from business, agriculture and government. And so far, there’s not an ounce of evidence of longer-term thinking in government or among its vocal and behind-the-scenes supporters.
In the meantime, the negative implications of overwhelming immigration continue be seen by business, agriculture and the government as someone else’s problems, or indeed further economic opportunities. Widespread homelessness? Collapsing infrastructure? Clogged cities? Wasted hours parked on the motorways? A new generation unable to buy homes? Plummeting environmental quality?
Blame the problems on the councils, the planners, lazy drugged up kiwis, the RMA, the last government, feckless families, anyone else. Leave the social ambulance to the NGO’s, the social services, the various available benefits. Everyone else is making money out of the situation. And that is the one and only measure the government and its backers have of success.
I read an article on genetically-modified crops and artificial photosynthesis which led me to believe that the traditional agricultural and dairy industries are under severe threat in the next 5-10 years. And here we have a politicians who looked at our first world country which historically compared itself to the other OECD member states and decided we were better of with a subsistence-driven economy like rural Asia.
This counter-productive mindset has made us worse-off across most qualitative indices. I admit we do well in terms of GDP growth and raw employment figures, but we are a developed high-income economy; we should not be viewing these figures in isolation.
Hospitality and tourism were the highest contributing sector to New Zealand's job growth in 2016. Need I say more?
Advisor - traditional agriculture has not stood still in NZ it is highly innovative. GE foods could well be the biggest threat which drives countries who adopt it into subsistence.......You got to keep buying the GE seeds every year or pay for the right to use the seeds.....supply and demand easily manipulated.....maybe ask the Indian farmers who have been caught out growing GE crops. Also read up on the high number of suicides amongst Indian farmers from failed crops and high debts to the GE seed owners.
What I see in NZ is that it is the few who are pulling the cart for the many. Most of the really good productive stuff happens outside a cities boundaries with the rewards filtering through to the cities.
City people are high users of resources to outputs and a large percentage seem signficantly hamstrung when it comes to invention of new products and services that would offer export potential/earnings. With the cities not pulling their weight when it comes to exportable products leads us to be directly reliant on rural activities to do the heavy lifting.
Subsistence living is mostly about the system that has been developed to deprive those of the benefits of their outputs.
Your argument makes complete sense. The drive to innovate comes from trying to solve a problem.
On NZ farms, that problem has always been keeping productivity high despite skill shortages and higher labour costs than Indian / African farms.
That might soon change since thousands of students from Asia joined the farm workforce for low wages.
There are business schools in remote farming towns such as Te Puke which are just migration agencies bringing cheap labour.
If good innovation is occuring on the farm surely it should flow into increased prices at the farmgate.
But as far as Im aware farmers are accepting payments in line with historic incomes...allowing for the normal boom bust cycle.
Innovation has been more noticeable in horticulture and, of course, Savignon Blanc, interesting but not wine as the french said. That didnt worry the Brits...or Yanks.
I would call your example Continuous Improvement or the even more daft Total Quality Management
Its basically running faster to stand still, a treadmill.
The automobile industry is an example, they cant break out of the price limits, the new ones, full of technology, are sold for the same price as the old ones.
Eventually they go broke, like Banks, Power Plants, Computer Hardware,most commodities..metals...
Agriculture is like that, a hiding to nothing.
Innvotion is happening and has been happening at a steady pace over the last 30 years....much of that innovation is not in the final product per se it is in on farm systems which has made certain jobs more efficient and economical so the bottom line gets a lift which assists in the down price times.
NZ lamb has enormous potential.
Way to take the argument into xenophobic territory... as opposed to the other well thought out comments here.
For clarity, perhaps you should understand more about southern us states. Spanish is common there not due entierely to immigration, but rather history. California and texas and parts of new mexico were actually under spanish dominion.. . It would be like you blaming the need to speak french in canada on french or african immigrants.
I saw that too:
First major study of ethnic Chinese voting habits in New Zealand finds Chinese have higher turnout rate than general population and strongly favor National (2017 voting intention: National 74%, Labour 16%, NZ First 5%, Act 4%, Greens 2%)
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/politics/news/article.cfm?c_id=280&objectid=1…
Three quarters of ethnic Chinese voters will cast their vote for National if an election was held tomorrow, a survey has found.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/lincoln-tan/news/article.cfm?a_id=308&objecti…
@misterB - yes its an uncomfortable conversation but one that has to be had nonetheless I believe.
To be scared of our "NZ'ness" (for lack of a better word) disappearing due to overwhelming immigration from 2 enormously populated non-western cultures is not "racist" or xenophobic - it seems very natural to me, who wants their small unique "culture" to disappear under this?
Its already happening - Have you been to the North Shore of Auckland lately...Pinehill, Albany?...how about Hillsborough, Papatoetoe or Blockhouse Bay? These have become enclaves of Chinese and Indian immigrants - trust me, no need for integration here.....
I live on the North Shore and often am, and feel the minority....in my own city...and yes its now reached the point where it is the # 1 issue for my vote this year.
And I'm no racist or xenophobe.
I'm pro highly targeted, specific and multi-country immigration but this insane policy of flooding us with primarily Chinese and Indian immigrants is crazy.
The Road to Somewhere by David Goodhart – a liberal’s rightwing turn on immigration
https://www.theguardian.com/books/2017/mar/22/the-road-to-somewhere-dav…
It says it is timely and mistaken (but that is The Guardian)
https://www.ft.com/content/39a0867a-0974-11e7-ac5a-903b21361b43
NZ is always at the bottom of the choices list and will stay there for a long time for perspective migrants. "highly targeted, specific and multi-country immigration" is not realistically within NZ's capability and what NZ needs is patriotism and unity. I find it's very rarely mentioned in NZ society and education system.
Nice framing, dude.
The number of Spanish speakers in the States is more than ten times since Adams–Onís Treaty. Very short with the facts and numbers... as opposed to the other well thought out comments here.
When more than 23% of Auckland's population is Asian, the political representatives are very short. And one reason is that Chinese people are not used to voting. Fancy Wong and Melissa Lee are doing well but very under-served politically.
Yes, I'm opposed to political righteous hypocrites and against the free entry because of the house prices are crazy.
This is why I'm spending a lot of time communicating that the Government is actively working against those that are 45 and under. National are trying to apply band aids but it's obvious that they didn't even see the backlash coming.
Then again what can you expect from the Cash Converters Party that sells all the assets and then borrows money. National behave like a bunch of junkies, then blame the youth for taking drugs as a reason for excessive immigration, and they have the cheek to turn NZ in to a tax haven for the 1%. The tax haven that is being used to channel drug money and other proceeds from organised crime.
I will give you a thumbs up if you remove the 45 and under. Im a NZer who wants the old NZ back, where young people are treated with respect and not called druggies. Where we train our young people to fill so called highly skilled roles. Where our house prices move to 3-5 times income, where we build our intellectual knowledge and become global in our aspirations, where we have wages that are not kept low by rampant immigration, where I can drive from Pukekohe to Auckland in under an hour again, I could go on. But I think you get my point.
... one of the great benefits for politicians of our modern obsession with electronic gadgets , is that we're all too hooked onto the internet , or on our cell-phones ... too addicted to these gizmos to gather up the pitchforks , the hot tar , and the feathers ... to march on parliament and show them first hand what we think of their mismanagement of our beloved country ...
As if we weren't already a nation of Sheeples ... FaceBook has firmly nailed our feet to the electronic floor ...
... BLIP BLIP ... oops , pardon me ... a text message just coming through ... get back to you later , ciao ..
I too want to vote for a rational immigration policy. But who to vote for? For example Winston fails the test that he has been in power before and despite his talk nothing happened.
Our current immigration system has 3 streams: humanitarian, family, "Skilled/Business" with 60% labelled as Skilled which sounds great until you meet your local immigrant at the checkout.
Is NZ's 'special bond' with Australia a thing of the past?
Kathryn Ryan
What is driving this?
Bernard Salt
There has been a fundamental shift in the Australian demography particularily the last 10 years or so preliminary results from the 2016 census released one montht ago show something quite unique. The western half of the country (Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territories) had quite a strong Anglo base (we draw our migrants from Anglo countries). The eastern side of the nation (particularily Victoria and New South Wales) are more likely to be Indian and Chinese . So the ethnic base (the source from which we are drawing migrants) has shifted in the last decade or so. I will say also the flow of Kiwis has reversed (the eartquake and a renewed energy with New Zealand). So there seems to be an ethnic basis to t(not a parting of the ways) but a slowing of the bond which had been there literally since resettlement.
KR
What is driving the politics?
BS
Well I do think the demographics are important : our shift in focus towards Asia (with the Chinese and the Indians). I don’t think it is so much a rejection of NZ as a pivot towards Asia. There was a shift away from the UK when Britain joined the EU. In some ways you could argue the same is happening here a shift towards Asia: Asian migration, Asian students, Asian implatation [ ?] infact. Our attention has been taken by South East Asia and as a consequence the politics may flow from that shift in thinking.
KR
The idea of New Zealanders being special is dissapearing apace (and was only based on a handshake between Whitlam and Kirk in the 1970s) [both multiculturalists] and was always amatter of goodwill.
BS
“politics pushing in that direction”
http://www.radionz.co.nz/national/programmes/ninetonoon/audio/201844412…
Blood is thicker than water?
Lots of media all over tbe dairy robberies in Sth Akl today.
I wonder whether any of this can be placed at the issue ethnic teenagers have of getting an entry level job these days. The petrol station jobs seem to have all gone to Indian students, the courier drivers seem to be all foreigners, supermarkets seem to have a lot more foreign youths, lets face it they are everywhere, orchards, farming everywhere.
Our street got fibre installed last month, the whole team was Indian with only one seeming to do the technical stuff, the rest was muscle.
Seems to be heading towards the Fiji story, Indians and others taking all the work until the kettle blew.
Why does National keep dong this?
(ps. found a petrol station today that wasn't staffed by Indians - Challenge Station in Greytown.)
Why does National keep doing this?
have you not heard the leader, he listens to his supporters who fund his party
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/89876945/bill-english-claims-a…
http://www.stuff.co.nz/national/politics/89858196/bill-english-says-emp…
Judging by Residency visas for those in the Investor Category then 40 Chinese for every 1 Indian. Rather surprising because in the UK and the USA many successful new businesses have been founded by people of Indian origin. As an Indian friend said "they are bringing in the wrong Indians".
Mass immigration into NZ from Asia and SouthEast Asia is not only a short term economic strategy, but also a peculiar political UN-type influenced ideology to reduce any kind of coherent society, challenge our institutions and challenge the values/heritage of New Zealand.
No wonder so many Kiwis can't find jobs in the current market. I know of people who have been made redundant who are still struggling to find employment. How is this record breaking migration gain going to help the locals?? Where is justice?? This has got to stop!!
Well the conversation has begun on this site and 1 or 2 others. I believe that immigration is THE issue that matters for the 2017 election. The housing crisis is just a subset, as are all our infrastructure predicaments and our declining GDP per capita status along with just about every other quality of life measure. Importing people en mass without a coherent plan robs our children of their future. The established players get to clip the ticket and enrich themselves while hope evaporates in the face of greater demand for scarce resources. Voting for NZ first is a risk but they are the only party prepared to challenge the currently accepted wisdom of immigration being 'good' for the country.
Worth giving TOP a chance? Can't see them replacing National but they do have interesting policies - doubt anyone could agree with them all but they would stir things up and from memory their immigration policy is more specific and less waffle than most. Hope this doesn't sound like an endorsement. See http://www.top.org.nz/top2 for immigration. The had salary as a criteria long before the Nationals but neither say how it would be enforced - a danger it could be a sieve rejecting the honest and keeping the cheats.
Good points. You wouldn't know there was a conversation from reading the Herald (for example) Ando. There are many intelligent, thoughtful people very concerned about our high levels of immigration but they are effectively blocked from the MSM. The Herald has had an almost daily pro immigration piece - with no supporting facts - or, equally as common, an attempt to smear opponents as redneck racists or xenophobic nut jobs. Ditto TVNZ and Mike Hosking etc.
What I find very concerning is that this feels like an orchestrated campaign to influence public opinion in one direction. Who or what is behind that? Quite creepy when you think about it that way.
Not totally true. The Herald has published many letters by writers against excess immigration; maybe one gets printed every time their letters editor gets stuck in a traffic jam. They have even printed some of mine which are generally against current immigration practices. However there is some truth in what you say, for example the latest figures for immigrants was published last week and made for an article on this website but I've seen no mention in the Herald. I have overheard some fairly strong racist speech in general conversation which if broadcast more widely could lead to unpleasantness - I don't blame the Herald for almost eliminating it from their pages.
Most of the pro-Immigration articles are one of two types either (a) very badly argued and never mention any limit or (b) about highly skilled immigration which NZ has never even defined let alone tried.
Intelligent discussion of the the negative effects of immigration never gets a look in.
For a no bullshit Maori academic view read Raninui Walker's article from over 20 years ago http://www.thesocialcontract.com/artman2/publish/tsc0402/article_316.sh…
Thanks Bob, I haven't seen the letters for some time but I can imagine that there would be many questioning the propaganda originating from the Herald et al. I was thinking something from the likes of Mighty Mike Reddell wouldn't go amiss, just to balance things up a bit and you can guarantee it would have a lot more substance than the usual trash they serve up.
Rangnui Walkers piece is well worth the time to read, thank you for posting it. Surprising that Maori aren't more vocal about this (latest) sell out.
A couple more points to add to this conversation. Once we're on an immigration-led growth binge it is very difficult to slow it down or stop it without severe economic and social consequences.
Increasing debt - deployed across the board to cover growth costs - needs increasing money to be earned for debt servicing. Reduce the flow of debt-servicing money and there's a financial crisis.
No less important, immigration-led employment gains become - as they are now - largely dependent on construction, infrastructure, housing and the rest of it. Slow these needs, and there's severe unemployment in consequence.
In both cases, the government's short-sighted policy is, in effect, a head-lock on its own future choices and those of any future administration. Who wants to trigger a financial crisis or cause substantial unemployment?
Third, it's clear that our immigration-led GDP growth is also driving New Zealand further down into a low personal earnings economy. Immigration and GDP are high. GDP per capita is flat-lining or falling. More people are earning but individual earnings are going nowhere or backwards. Set this against inflated housing costs, whether to buy or rent, and there's sharply increased poverty.
Once it starts it can't be stopped - It's been said before in a different way
The never-ending need for exploited work-visa victims
The domino effect - This is the same as house prices - only in reverse
It only needs one to start the process then the ripple effect takes control
If a business recruits and exploits migrant labour at $2 per hour and the intending work-visa holder then has to pay $20,000 to the business owner then that business is far more profitable than its nearest competitor next door. Can and will cut prices. The now struggling competitor has to do the same thing which then squeezes the 3rd guy down the road who then squeezes the 4th guy and so on ad infinitum until they are all in the same boat all doing the same thing, competing against one another - they are back to where they started
Now they all need a never-ending supply of exploited temporary work-visa victims to stay in business
NZ Society is much the poorer for it and has to pick up the tab in infrastructure, schools, health, welfare etc
30 April 2017 - http://www.interest.co.nz/opinion/87394/episode-when-alex-and-his-polit…
and ....
for once ZB-Hosking manic-political-shouting is dead right - for the wrong reason
Mike Hosking - NZ Herald - 11 May 2017 - Argues we have to keep the 70,000 coming
Can't Stop - otherwise will bring the country to its knees
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=11853337
Yes, the voice for hire was basically saying that we have to make the Ponzi bigger otherwise it will cause the host to die. Sounds like a parasitic environment to me.
You know that Piggy was wrong don't you about Kiwis into Oz making both countries smarter.....when she goes bang there will be manure everywhere and young FHBs who have just lost their jobs will still have a $500k mortgage.
Working man; yes the labour market consequences of turning off the tap quickly will be felt to a degree. However the sooner we do the less harm done. I don't see debt repayment issues or any financial trigger effect from reducing low skilled/ low waged immigration. These immigrants are at the consumption end of the economy so they boost demand while also acting as a source of wage suppression.
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