The growth lobby often argues that Australia needs to run high levels of immigration in order to alleviate so-called skills shortages and to mitigate an ageing population.
This view has been debunked many times on this blog.
First, analysis from the Department of Employment shows that Australia’s skills shortage “remains low by historical standards” .Second, there are big question marks over whether immigration can alleviate skills shortages anyway?That is, if Australia imports a whole bunch of workers to alleviate, say, shortages in construction, these workers will inevitably increase demand in other areas (e.g. for various services), thus creating shortages there. Australia […]
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