President: Sustainable Population Australia Corporate Analyst, | retweet or follow does not mean endorsement | 11 years working in Africa, PNG & London
Perth
Joined January 2012
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Peter Strachan retweeted
The economic arguments in favor of high immigration are a sham. The NON-economic arguments are even more compelling - destruction of Australia's biosphere. erosion of our lifestyle, importing poverty, increasing social division. It is a big business agenda.
abc.net.au/news/2026-09-21/m…
@AlanKohler misses the point. Rapid population growth is the productivity killer.
Canada's productivity recovered when it reduced population growth, since this provides an incentive to invest in training, technology, and better processes.
Peter Strachan retweeted
Flooding the economy with cheap labour inevitably makes it more labour-intensive. And since "productivity" generally refers to "labour productivity", mass immigration almost by definition reduces it.
Peter Strachan retweeted
SPA also notes that, over the past 20 years, immigration has failed to deliver adequate housing & failed to lift skills in a way that raises real wages or increases labour productivity.
Oh well, maybe the next million arrivals will fix it!
population.org.au/media-rele…
Peter Strachan retweeted
it's fake news mate, why would Ukrainians be shooting at Ukrainians on video? Russian propaganda has no limits or shame, tomorrow they'll be saying Japan nuked itself; filthy empire that occupied parts of Eastern Europe for 400-500 years, you can't trust anything Russian gov says about Ukraine
abc.net.au/news/2026-09-21/m…
@AlanKohler misses the point. Rapid population growth is the productivity killer.
Canada's productivity recovered when it reduced population growth, since this provides an incentive to invest in training, technology, and better processes.
abc.net.au/news/2026-10-17/c…
I thought this was the sort of crime we expect in 3rd-world places like South Africa, but no, it's apparently come to Australia now.
population.org.au/media-rele…
We seem to live in a Schrödinger’s economy, where we have both a skills shortage AND high unemployment at the same time, with AI taking over many occupations.
Let's #LiveWithinLimits
Peter Strachan retweeted
What would happen if we pushed the button?
Wages would rise in many sectors.
Private sector jobs would be more attractive to public sector workers & students doing low-value degrees.
Employers would innovate & automate more.
We’d fix our welfare & training systems.
All good.
Peter Strachan retweeted
Basically, the number of foreign WORKERS in many sectors is about equal to the number of foreign CUSTOMERS in those sectors.
If we didn't have so many foreign CUSTOMERS, we wouldn't need so many foreign WORKERS.
Foreign CUSTOMERS create the "need" for foreign WORKERS.
Peter Strachan retweeted
37% of people aged 15-64 in Australia are foreign-born.
So it's no surprise they make up a similar proportion of workers in many sectors.
Yes, it’s higher in the residential care sector: 60%. That's just under 200k workers.
We could find 200k Australian workers if we had to.
In the face of widespread calls from business groups for an ongoing, rapid pace of immigration-fuelled population expansion to meet perceived skill shortages, the Australian Bureau of Statistics reports that the nation’s unemployment rate rose to a 5-year high of 4.7% in September 2026
If never-ending population growth is the answer for Australian society, @SustPopAus wants to know what the question is!
Australia must increase focus on investment in retraining and up-skilling the unemployed while investing in productivity-enhancing systems and technology, so that the economy works for people, and not the reverse
Ongoing infill suburban housing development, along with the destruction of bushland and productive agricultural areas, destroys the natural environment on which all life depends
After a population increase of 48% or 9.1 million people since the turn of the century, demand-driven increases in housing costs, along with rapidly rising costs of living, are destroying the quality of life for most Australian residents, including those who have recently arrived
If Australia had a real skill shortage, the underemployment rate would not remain at 6.3%, & real wages would be rising to attract workers, not stagnating as has been the case.
Peter Strachan retweeted
Gittins:
"Any economist will tell you that you don't want to live in an economy with a falling population."
Japan's population has fallen 3.7% since 2010. Our population is up 25.3% over that period.
Yet real GDP per capita is up 15.9% in Japan but only 14.1% in Australia.
Peter Strachan retweeted
25 yrs ago we warned that mass immigration would make Australians poorer.
But it seems people had to experience the pain before they'd listen to us.
"National President of SPA, Dr Harry Cohen, said today that anyone looking at the world rankings in terms of GDP per capita, could see that most wealthy nations have stable & low populations while those with rapid growth rates are the poorest"
-SPA Media Release 18 Feb 2002
population.org.au/media-rele…
If the benefits outweigh the costs, how is it that government budgets are in deficit and declining? How is it that even after adding 5.7 million people through net immigration this century, there are more skill shortages than ever, while real wages stagnate and labour productivity is in decline? How is it that housing costs double every 8-10 years under the pressure of demand, driven by a third-world pace of population expansion, while open spaces, productive farmland and native animal habitats are cleared for housing estates, fast-food outlets and petrol stations?
Why is the government's failure to see these unfolding environmental, economic and social disasters forcing voters to look at alternatives?
theguardian.com/australia-ne…
As its net immigration flow has fallen to almost zero, Canada's per capita GDP growth has significantly outpaced Australia’s by a large margin.
macrobusiness.com.au/2026/10…
Moving 75k people into small, underdeveloped cities in the 1950s has a completely different economic impact than moving 300k people into complex, built-out cities today.
Rather than creating room to grow, it chokes and creates a doom loop for living standards.
macrobusiness.com.au/2026/10…
