PM Albanese has Australia on course for 150m within life-time of a child born today

Australia’s  population of 26.5m grew at the rate of 2.2% (year ending March 2023.) At 2.2% growth rate our current population would increase to 30m within 10 years and double in 31.85 yrs and would reach 150m by 2103, within the life-expectancy of a child born today. Less than 25% of that 2.2 rate of population growth was due to natural increase. Without the 454,361 migration, we would have grown at about 0.55%. (https://population.gov.au/data-and-forecasts/dashboards/national-state-and-territory-population-overview) [1]

Australia’s  population of 26.5m grew at the rate of 2.2% (year ending March 2023.) At 2.2% growth rate our current population would increase to 30m within 10 years and double in 31.85yrs and would reach 150m by 2103, within the life-expectancy of a child born today.

Less than 25% of that 2.2 rate of population growth was due to natural increase. Without the 454,361 migration, we would have grown at about 0.55%. That figure would reflect what Australians consider to be a viable rate of growth, in their choice of family size. It also indicates the proportion of demand for housing, infrastructure water, power etc that comes from overseas migration.

In May PM Albanese initiated with PM Modi an almost open borders policy for migration from India, which is a continent with over 1 billion people and a huge diaspora. https://www.thisisaustralia.com/.../australia-india.../ This agreement does not include caps on number of visas offered, that is, it imposes no limits. That implies a wish to continue the current galloping population growth rate and probably to increase it.

The Financial Review implies that both sides of parliament want a population of about 150m but won’t tell the Australian population because they know we would panic. (Jacob Greber, 'Why Australia needs millions more people – and is getting there fast', The Australian Financial Review Magazine, July 27 2023) The Sydney Morning Herald is cagier, but reveals that we are on course for 30m in 2033. (https://www.smh.com.au/.../big-australia-we-could-double...)

History of the population growth lobby also documents a push for about 150m by professional growth lobbies like APop, and pushed via the Murdoch and Fairfax press via Phil Ruthven and Richard Pratt, although recent boosters have learned not to put a figure on it because they know it panics the rest of us. (Sheila Newman, The Growth Lobby in Australian and its Absence in France, pp.125-131.)

Australia has a history of underestimating future population growth by a very wide margin. In only 2002 the Treasury Intergenerational Report forecast we would not reach 25.7m until 2050 (in 48 yrs), but we have already passed that number at 26.5 in 2023 – in the space of only 21 years !

"Australia’s population in 2050 was forecast to be 25.7 million in the first 2002 Treasury Intergenerational Report. By the time of the 2021 edition, that forecast was raised to 35.3 million. “That’s a difference of more than one-third,” Leigh noted. “Put another way, we’ve now got more people in Australia than the first intergenerational reports thought we’d have in 2050.”" (Jacob Greber, , 'Why Australia needs millions more people – and is getting there fast', The Australian Financial Review Magazine, July 27 2023)

NOTES

[1] Australian Government Centre for Population: https://population.gov.au/data-and-forecasts/dashboards/national-state-and-territory-population-overview
Data for the year ending March 2023: Australia's total population: 26,473,055
Australia's annual population growth rate 2.2%
Natural Increase (births minus deaths) was 108,844
Net Overseas Migration was 454,361