Australian population to hit 35 Million in year 2049

http://www.news.com.au/national/australian-population-to-hit-35-million-in-20...
The total fertility rate of Australian women has increased to more than 1.9 births per woman in recent years / File

Australian population to hit 35 million in 2049
By Stefanie Balogh

The Courier-Mail
September 18, 2009 * Australian population to grow, will be younger * Caused by fertility rates and migration * Will no longer be an ageing population

THE Australian population will explode to 35 million people in a generation, and we will be younger than previously thought.

Our demographic surge will be driven by more women of childbearing age, higher fertility rates, and increased net overseas migration.

Treasurer Wayne Swan will today provide a glimpse into the future when he reveals key details from the much-anticipated third Intergenerational Report, The Courier-Mail reports.

The full report, due to be released before next year's federal Budget, is a crucial planning tool.

With Treasury Secretary Ken Henry's review of the nation's taxation system, the intergenerational data will guide the Rudd Government's policies for the nation's growing and ageing population.

Mr Swan will tell the launch of the Australian Institute For Population Ageing Research in Sydney that the proportion of people over 65 will almost double to 25 per cent of all Australians in 2049.

But the proportion is slightly less than previously projected.

In his speech, Mr Swan will say "the population ageing story in Australia is changing".

The updated Intergenerational report will predict Australia's population will grow by 65 per cent to 35 million people in 2049. It was previously tipped to reach 28.5 million in 2047.

The extra 6.5 million Australians over 40 years will come from births and migration.

"Our projections suggest that Australia's population could be larger and younger than presented in previous (intergenerational reports)," Mr Swan will say.

He says the total fertility rate of Australian women has increased to more than 1.9 births per woman in recent years - a level of fertility not seen since the 1980s.

Migration to Australia will also increase, and Mr Swan says these people "tend to be younger than the resident population, and ... contribute to the projected larger and younger Australian population".

But despite changes to the nation's demographic make-up in four decades, the drain on government services including health, pensions and aged care will come from a greying population.

The proportion of the population aged 85 and over is projected to increase most rapidly, rising from 1.7 per cent of the population in 2009 to 5 per cent in 2049.

The Government has laid the groundwork to tackle the ageing population by raising the pension age to 67 from 65 at a rate of six months every two years from 2017.

Mr Swan's Budget boost to pensions begins next week, with single pensioners on the maximum rate receiving an extra $70.83 every fortnight, and couples on the maximum rate getting $29.93 more.

"Over the next 40 years it is projected that the number of young people and the number of people of traditional working age will both increase by about 45 per cent," the Treasurer will say.

"But here's the thing - over the same 40-year period, the number of older people aged 65-84 years will more than double and the number of very old people aged 85 and over will increase by more than 4 1/2 times."

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• Australia
• population
• 35
• Million
• by
• year
• 2049

[ozwasp]

So we need immigration to fund retirees... If that's the case, then those migrants will need more migrants to fund their retirement too - it's a stupid spiral, that doesn't make sense.

[djdarren2056]

@ozwasp lol its the ausy GUV... it is not supposed to make sense :P

[showlink]

Indonesian/Malaysian? 2 more overpop countries. Which one are you from?

[78CAK]

@iskandar1111 We need to fund penisions, have more kids, have less immigration, work out water issues, get out of Afghanistan, vote in a Liberal government, build more cities and pay less tax. Is any of that going to happen?

[Celtic450]

This is funny. In 2001 they said we would hit 23 million by 2030 now its 2010 and we already hit it. These fucking politicians and big business need to have their own personal safety made accountable for their mass immigration policies.

[hikerzb]

@iskandar1111 That's the biggest load I've read yet. We're called a "continent" because of the large land mass not because of how much fertile land we have and we do NOT have "plenty of water".

[hikerzb]

@iskandar1111 Have you noticed how many elderly immigrants we're getting here?

[hikerzb]

@iskandar1111 What BS. Women in this country are having more babies than many other countries.

[ChristophInns]

Read local news reports for both Australia and the US. If a locality's population is stable this is "stagnant" and a cause for deep concern. It its growing this is always described as a positive. Both countries are addicted to perpetual population growth. But population stabilization will come eventually, unavoidably, and it will be wrenching.

[iskandar1111]

@ozwasp

The only way prosperity comes is with a higher ratio of working to non working population.

[iskandar1111]

@ozwasp

Every society on the planet has a central dogma of replacing the old with the new. If you don't do that then your non working population will increase.

We cannot have prosperity without growth. We are humans, not rabbits. More people makes more ideas, more technology, more capitalism, more money. We will only prosper with more people. Eventually there is always a limit, such as in Bangladesh - heavily overpopulated for the land - but Australia is nowhere near that.

[iskandar1111]

@ozwasp

The only way to get a younger population is to have more babies or more immigration.

For the resources issue. Australia has plenty of resources, plenty of water. We have more fertile land than France, with a third of their population. That's why they call us a continent. The only reason we are going through droughts is because we haven't built enough infrastructure to utilise our resources.

[iskandar1111]

@ozwasp

Increasing the working age is only a solution until all of those people eventually go into retirement, which they eventually will, and we are back where we were before, so then we have to increase the working age even more. We can't keep increasing the working age forever, that is why it's a band aid solution.

What you want to do is just do the best with what we have, what we need is a younger population. Currently, the median age of Australians has been increasing.