Australia's ageing immigrant population bomb

While short-term migration forecasts may soothe Canberra, five decades of compounding growth reveal a far bigger story — an ageing immigrant population that is quietly reshaping Australia’s demographic future, writes Sheila Newman.

IN AN ARTICLE titled Can we rely on Treasury’s latest net migration forecasts? Dr Abul Rizvi, a former senior Australian immigration official, analyses the Australian Treasury's December 2025 Population Statement, confidently asserting that net overseas migration (NOM) has “zero chance” of rebounding to the 2025 peaks of 550,000.

Pointing to a decline from post-COVID highs (538,000 in 2022-23 to 306,000 in 2024-25), Rizvi predicts a 2025-26 NOM of around 290,000, driven by new visa pathways (for example, higher student caps, Pacific Engagement Visas, M.A.T.E.S. for Indian professionals) but offset by rising departures from expiring temporary visas. He pins his assurance on policy tightenings and labour market dynamics that, he argues, will prevent wild surges while keeping migration high but manageable.

Rizvi's focus is, however, so narrow, spanning less than two years of trends, that it ignores the broader canvas of Australia's population growth over the past half-century. This short timeframe avoids looking at the cumulative impacts of sustained migration on national demographics, particularly in terms of overall growth rates, accumulated population pressures and the evolving age structure, including the rapid aging of immigrant cohorts themselves.

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Step back and look at the big picture

To appreciate the limitations of this perspective (shared by many mass media demographers), one must zoom out to the long arc of Australia's population history. Over the last 50 years, from 1971 to 2021, the nation's population nearly doubled, surging from 13.1 million to 25.7 million, with an average annual growth rate of 1.4%, outpacing many developed peers. This growth accelerated post-WWII, peaking above 2% in the 1950s–60s amid the baby boom and mass migration, before settling at 1–1.5% in recent decades.

By June 2025, the population had reached 27.6 million, with annual growth at 1.5% (420,100 people), fuelled predominantly by NOM at 306,000 — accounting for about 73% of that increase.

Natural increase (births minus deaths) has steadily declined as a driver, contributing just 114,600 in 2024-25, down from 60% of growth pre-2000 to around 27% today. NOM, in contrast, has become the dominant force since the mid-2000s, averaging 220,000 annually from 2005-2019 and spiking post-pandemic before tapering.

Over five-year periods, net migration figures have fluctuated – from highs of 140,000 in the early 2020s to projections stabilising around 235,000 long-term – but the accumulated effect is profound. Since 1971, migration has added millions (29% overseas-born by 2021, up from 23% in 1901) amid falling fertility (from 3.1 births per woman in 1921 to 1.7 in 2021). The post-WWII baby boom, fuelled by cheap oil, produced unprecedented global population numbers, but it is unreasonable to try to sustain this anomaly forever.

Incremental population growth compounds

Rizvi's emphasis on short-term trends (less than two years) overlooks how these incremental additions compound over decades into transformative pressures. For instance, the 1.4% average growth rate may seem modest, but it has translated into an additional 14.5 million people since 1971, straining infrastructure, housing and services in ways that episodic forecasts like Rizvi's fail to address.

Rizvi's prediction of 290,000 NOM for 2025-26, while plausible in isolation (aligning with Treasury's 260,000 but factoring in student surges and skilled visas), ignores the long-tail effects: sustained NOM at even 235,000 annually could push the population to 35-40 million by mid-century, exacerbating urban congestion and environmental strains. Critics of high immigration highlight these cumulative burdens, arguing that short-term numbers mask perpetual growth without proportional benefits.

Rizvi’s calming view overlooks how post-2000s NOM dominance (57% of growth) has locked Australia into a migration-dependent trajectory — potentially unsustainable economically, socially, environmentally and infrastructurally.

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The ageing immigrant population bomb

A very underexplored dimension in Rizvi's piece is the intersection of migration and population ageing, which amplifies these long-term problems. Over the past 50 years, Australia's median age has risen dramatically – from 27.5 years in 1971 to 38.2 years in 2021, and 38.3 years in 2024 – driven by declining fertility and improved life expectancy (up 26 years since 1901).

The proportion of those aged 65 or more has climbed from around 8% in the 1970s to 16% by 2020, projected to reach 20-25% by 2056, with the “working-age” share peaking at 67.5% in 2009 and declining since. In the old industrial paradigm (pre-casualisation and AI), working-age immigrants temporarily offset aging by boosting the labour force. But immigrants age, too, and arrive older than native-born, contributing disproportionately to the elderly bulge.

From 1996 to 2016, the overseas-born over-65 population doubled from 0.68 million to 1.38 million (104% growth vs 51% for Australia-born), raising their share from 30.9% to 37.6% of the elderly cohort. Projections to 2056 anticipate the overseas-born elderly swelling to 3.5 million (53% growth from 2016 to 2036 alone).

Reports from the Federation of Ethnic Communities' Councils of Australia (FECCA) highlight this “rapid ageing of immigrant cohorts”, noting that culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) elderly face unique vulnerabilities, such as language barriers, lower superannuation and higher disability needs, with their numbers expected to quintuple in some groups, like dementia cases among non-English speakers.

Rizvi's short-term view, focused on inflows like skilled young professionals, neglects how these migrants will eventually swell the aging ranks, potentially doubling workforce-ageing rates.

While Rizvi's view that immigration is unlikely to reach 2025 peaks may be designed to reassure, his analysis falters by confining itself to fleeting trends. Australia's 50-year demographic history shows a nation changed by migration-fuelled growth, from a youthful post-war society to an artificially aged and slowing liberal economy with 31.5% overseas-born residents.

The real story lies in the accumulated numbers – 14 million added since 1971 – and the inexorable ageing wave, where immigrants increasingly dominate the elderly demographic. Policymakers would do well to heed this broader context, balancing short-term economic gains against the long-term imperatives of sustainability and equity.

Rizvi's insights are a useful snapshot, but they capture only the ripple, not the tide.

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To move toward a sustainable, lower-population trajectory, Australia might recalibrate net overseas migration to a range of zero-net to 70,000 annually. This could be achieved by phasing out non-essential skilled visas (prioritising domestic retraining), limiting family reunions to immediate relatives only and ending student visa extensions that inflate temporary stays. Zero-net would allow natural increase alone; 70,000 would provide modest flexibility for genuine skill gaps. Either path would reduce annual growth to about 0.3–0.6%, bringing the population to 27–29 million by 2050.

Short-term, some sectors (aged care, construction) would face labour gaps, but these could be filled by retraining displaced locals (such as nurses and doctors already here and who once manned our hospitals and nursing homes) and incentives for domestic participation, debunking the furphy that we must import carers who will then themselves increase the ageing cohort and Australia’s ageing-rate.

Economically, lower population pressure would reduce land, housing, energy, water and food costs, creating a far more hospitable environment for small and medium businesses. Cheaper inputs would help Australian firms compete globally with other countries (most countries have lower housing costs and therefore lower costs of doing business), reverse deindustrialisation and lift real wages through genuine job creation rather than endless population growth to mask structural weaknesses.

Socially and environmentally, it would ease housing/infrastructure strain, reduce inequality and cultural tensions, and preserve farmland, water, nature and biodiversity. Over time, cheaper land and resources would enable relocalisation, rebuilding flexible, low-cost kin and place-based support networks that industrial urbanisation and high-density planning have fractured.

This natural default (extended family, community reciprocity) is far more resilient and affordable than the current high-cost, contractualised dependency model of salaried work, debt and professionalised care. Policymakers can choose to support this organic shift or continue propping up an increasingly fragile industrial system.

Fears of a continuously falling population without immigration often overlook a simple reality: Australia's and the world's population numbers are already higher than at any point in history, and uncomfortably so in many dimensions. Economic prospects are declining under these pressures, not improving. History and research show that people tend to have more children when they feel optimistic about the future, when housing is affordable, wages rise and hope replaces precarity.

Professor Virginia Abernethy’s Fertility Opportunity Hypothesis demonstrates this link between perceived opportunity and fertility; similarly, my own analysis in Land Tenure and the Revolution in Democracy and Birth Control in France shows how secure land access and self-determination historically supported smaller, healthier families.

In a genuine democracy, fertility is unlikely to remain at current levels indefinitely, nor should it. Population will likely continue to fall for a generation or two as societies adjust, but there is no credible path to extinction. What we face is not demographic doom, but an overdue correction from an unsustainable peak.

Ideologically, this would be a revolution for our power elite because it counters our dominant mass media narrative. Australia would need to greatly diversify the media and allow new ideas and new political actors to transform the public messaging system. That’s probably the hardest lever of all to pull in the growth machine.

Sheila Newman is a sociologist and author of various books on energy resources, population and housing policy systems and editor of https://candobetter.net.