"For more than a decade, the Productivity Commission has debunked the common myth that immigration can overcome population ageing. [...] If Australia was truly a ‘clever’ country like Japan, it would manage population ageing by: 1) better utilising existing workers, given there is significant spare capacity in the labour market; and 2) where required resort to technological solutions. The last thing that Australia should be doing is running a mass immigration program which, as noted many times by the PC, cannot provide a long-term solution to ageing, lowers wages, and places increasing strains on infrastructure, housing and the natural environment." This article first published at #comments">https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2017/06/poor-old-japan-low-unemployment-less-crowded-cheaper-housing/#comments
For more than a decade, the Productivity Commission has debunked the common myth that immigration can overcome population ageing. For example:
PC (2005): “Despite popular thinking to the contrary, immigration policy is also not a feasible countermeasure [to an ageing population]. It affects population numbers more than the age structure”.
PC (2010): “Realistic changes in migration levels also make little difference to the age structure of the population in the future, with any effect being temporary“…
PC (2011): “…substantial increases in the level of net overseas migration would have only modest effects on population ageing and the impacts would be temporary, since immigrants themselves age… It follows that, rather than seeking to mitigate the ageing of the population, policy should seek to influence the potential economic and other impacts”…
PC (2016): “[Immigration] delays rather than eliminates population ageing. In the long term, underlying trends in life expectancy mean that permanent immigrants (as they age) will themselves add to the proportion of the population aged 65 and over”.
In a nutshell, trying to overcome an ageing population through higher immigration is a Ponzi scheme. It requires ever more immigration, with the associated negative impacts on economic and social infrastructure, congestion, housing affordability, and the environment.
The obvious question that follows is, if immigration is not the solution to the ‘problem’ of population ageing, then what is? Enter Japan, whose population is both shrinking and ageing quickly:
And whose labour market is tight, with Japan’s unemployment rate recently hitting a 22-year low of just 2.8% (if only Australia was so lucky!):
Rather than open the immigration spigots for a short-term fix, and in the process crush-load infrastructure and housing, Japan has instead taken the high tech route of engaging in automation.
Population boosters in Australia often label Japan an ‘economic basket case’ due to its ageing population. But the facts do not back this assertion up. In addition to having an unemployment rate that Australian workers could only dream of, as well as a relatively affordable housing market, Japan’s GDP growth in per capita terms has been highly respectable, as it has been for most other nation’s with declining populations:
These facts have not been lost on the Center for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR), which has penned the following rebuke to the clam that Japan is facing a ‘dismal’ future due to population ageing:
The NYT featured yet another piece on a country, in this case Japan, facing a future with a lower population. The piece warns that it will be difficult to maintain economic growth with a declining population and that Japan’s labor shortage would get more severe.
This doesn’t sound like too bad of a story to people familiar with economics. Thus far the labor shortage has not been serious enough to cause wages to rise in Japan. If it eventually does get more severe and wages do rise then it just would mean that some of the least productive jobs would go unfilled. For example, perhaps Tokyo would no longer pay workers to shove people into overcrowded subway cars.
As far as GDP growth, economists usually care about GDP per capita as a measure of living standards, not total GDP. This is why Denmark is a richer country than India, even though India has a much larger GDP…
It is worth reminding readers that growth in productivity swamps the impact of demographics. If Japan can sustain a 1.5 percent pace of productivity growth, then output per worker hour would be 80 percent higher in forty years. Even in a very extreme demographic change, say going from three workers per retiree to 1.8 workers per retiree, this would still allow for a 17 percent rise in average living standards over this period… And this does not account for the benefits from less strain on the infrastructure and the natural environment. Nor does it take account of the lower ratio of dependent children to workers…
Presumably the folks who are concerned about the job-killing robots expect that productivity growth will be considerably more rapid.
We also shouldn’t forget that economists at MIT recently found that there is absolutely no relationship between population ageing and economic decline. To the contrary, population aging seems to have been associated with improvements in GDP per capita, thanks to increased automation:
If anything, countries experiencing more rapid aging have grown more in recent decades… we show that since the early 1990s or 2000s, the periods commonly viewed as the beginning of the adverse effects of aging in much of the advanced world, there is no negative association between aging and lower GDP per capita… on the contrary, the relationship is significantly positive in many specifications.
If Australia was truly a ‘clever’ country like Japan, it would manage population ageing by: 1) better utilising existing workers, given there is significant spare capacity in the labour market; and 2) where required resort to technological solutions.
The last thing that Australia should be doing is running a mass immigration program which, as noted many times by the PC, cannot provide a long-term solution to ageing, lowers wages, and places increasing strains on infrastructure, housing and the natural environment.
The ABC is a driving force behind the corrupt agenda setting bias of Australian politics. A clear explanation of this is provided by the ABC News and Current Affairs, who seem confused about their role. They seem to think they can use agenda setting bias as a tool in their manipulative armoury, as if they are elected politicians rather than journalists with a Statutory Duty to act as objective critics of the political agenda. Instead the ABC News team seems dedicated to creating agenda setting bias to ironically reinforce the objectives of the major political parties.
This is best illustrated by the contrast between the Statutory Duty of politicians as described in the oaths or affirmations that are required of them, and the Statutory Duty of the ABC which is focussed on impartiality and the avoidance of deliberate misrepresentation:
Oath
I, [Minister’s full name], do swear that I will well and truly serve the Commonwealth of Australia in the office of [position]. So help me God!
or Affirmation
I, [Minister’s full name], do solemnly and sincerely affirm and declare that I will well and truly serve the commonwealth of Australia in the office of [position]
Refer to the ABC Editorial Policy document and the ABC Code of Practice to understand what is required of the ABC.
A key driver of the sinking of Australian politics to such low levels in recent years has surely been the ABC's role in chaperoning public policy debate to where it pleases, which is often where politicians wish to take it.
The most important example of this in recent years has been the Carbon Tax debate incorporating the bias of ABC News. That pro Carbon Tax and pro population growth bias has taught us all an important lesson that only an open class action lawsuit can ultimately prove; because the ABC complaints process appears to be as biased and dysfunctional as the ABC's conduct of Editorial Policy.
By using unlawful tactics to support the passage of the Carbon Tax in November 2011 there have been real costs incurred by both industry and government.
This has resulted in many forms of injury to the Australian people. This injury has been inflicted on us all, and the ABC has acted unlawfully in supporting the perpetration of that injury on us all.
Mark O'Connor (famous co-author of Overloading Australia) asks, should environmentalists resist Big Australia - and the densification of Melbourne? "In the long run, unless we can stop the endless growth of population and consumption, all environmental battles will be lost. Yet powerful vested interests distort our news and media to make us think growth is inevitable, and that we should live in ever more crowded cities. Mark O'Connor discusses how environmentalists can identify and defeat these forces." Look for the Sustainable Population Australia (Victorian Branch) stall there as well - all weekend and Friday.
Time:
Feb 17th 2012 Sustainable Living Festival, 4 pm
Place:
At one of the Talks Tents that has been re-named The SHED, Yarra Bank/Birrarung Marr near Flinders St Station
Title: Sustainability versus Australia's growth lobby.
Mark O'Connor asks Should environmentalists resist Big Australia -- and the densification of Melbourne?
In the long run, unless we can stop the endless growth of population and consumption, all environmental battles will be lost. Yet powerful vested interests distort our news and media to make us think growth is inevitable, and that we should live in ever more crowded cities. Mark O'Connor discusses how environmentalists can identify and defeat these forces. Mark, a widely-published poet, is also co-author of Overloading Australia, a book that re-ignited the population debate, and which Dick Smith sent to every Australian State and Federal politician. He blogs at http://markoconnor-australianpoet.blogspot.com/
Overloading Australia
How Governments and the media dither and deny on population
(Click book image for purchase details.)
Author: Mark O'Connor and William Lines
ISBN: 978-0-85881-224-6
Greenhouse gases going up. Oil and gas depleting. House prices exploding. Overloading Australia explains why – and how to stop it.
The press of numbers on this continent affects us all – those living, as well as those yet to be born. To talk of saving the environment or of climate change is meaningless if we won’t address population – a subject some think too hot for public debate. In a score of punchy chapters, authors Mark O’Connor and William Lines challenge the myths, expose the facts, and dent the denial industry.
They blow the whistle on population-foolish policies that lead to clogged roads, water shortages, scarce food, and no place for refugees; then provide new and fair ways to think about the issues and to limit Australia’s future population-size.
This is a book that will revolutionize the green debate, and the political debate, on population.
See also Tony's article on candobetter.net: "Japan Earthquake, Tsunami and Nuclear Disaster - A personal story about the next 100 years of human history"
This film signals the beginning of a major campaign to say No to Nukes that Tony Boys is launching from his farm in the nuclear hot-spot that beautiful ancient Japan has become. He asks the rest of the world to take notice and try to prevent more situations like this. He wants no new nuclear plants to be built and for current reactors to be phased out within their pre-set time. In the film he also discusses democracy, population growth, and a future without plentiful petroleum or plentiful nuclear power.
There is more footage where we discuss arable land in Japan and some options that might be available but I do not have the time to edit this yet.
Hopefully things will not deteriorate too much further in Japan and we will have more articles from Tony.
Sorry about the crackling sound; the interview was done on a computer linked phone.
"For more than a decade, the Productivity Commission has debunked the common myth that immigration can overcome population ageing. [...] If Australia was truly a ‘clever’ country like Japan, it would manage population ageing by: 1) better utilising existing workers, given there is significant spare capacity in the labour market; and 2) where required resort to technological solutions. The last thing that Australia should be doing is running a mass immigration program which, as noted many times by the PC, cannot provide a long-term solution to ageing, lowers wages, and places increasing strains on infrastructure, housing and the natural environment." This article first published at #comments">https://www.macrobusiness.com.au/2017/06/poor-old-japan-low-unemployment-less-crowded-cheaper-housing/#comments
Mark O'Connor (famous co-author of Overloading Australia) asks, should environmentalists resist Big Australia - and the densification of Melbourne? "In the long run, unless we can stop the endless growth of population and consumption, all environmental battles will be lost. Yet powerful vested interests distort our news and media to make us think growth is inevitable, and that we should live in ever more crowded cities. Mark O'Connor discusses how environmentalists can identify and defeat these forces." Look for the Sustainable Population Australia (Victorian Branch) stall there as well - all weekend and Friday.
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