Australia’s Biggest Export Might Be Its Own Young People
Australia exports iron ore, coal, natural gas, and university degrees to the rest of the world. Increasingly, it may also be exporting something it never intended to: its own young people.
More than half of Australians aged 18 to 35 say they would consider moving overseas because of housing costs. Sixteen per cent say they definitely would, according to a 2025 survey by Home in Place. Only one in five believe they are “very likely” to ever own a home in Australia, and more than half already spend over 30% of their income on rent.
The hard numbers have not caught up with that sentiment yet. According to the ABS, 81,510 Australian citizens left the country in 2024–25. That was slightly fewer than the year before and below the pre-pandemic average. But the longer-term pattern is harder to dismiss. Australian-born residents recorded a net loss of 17,000 people in 2024–25 alone, continuing a decade-long trend that was interrupted only briefly by the pandemic. Survey sentiment often appears before it shows up in migration statistics. And the reason people give is remarkably consistent: housing has stopped feeling like something you can save for and started feeling like something you can be priced out of.
The Investment Nobody Accounts For
There is another way to look at this that rarely appears in migration statistics: through the economics of human capital.
A person raised in Australia represents years of public investment before they ever earn a dollar. That investment includes Family Tax Benefit payments, subsidised dental care through the Child Dental Benefits Schedule, bulk-billed GP visits, a subsidised education system, and potentially a HECS-HELP loan for the degree the country will eventually need them to use. By their mid-twenties, Australia may have spent close to two decades investing in that person.
And there is another part of that investment that is harder to measure: language, familiarity with Australian institutions, culture, traditions, and the professional networks that make someone productive in a particular economy.
In investment terms, the country has already paid most of the upfront cost. The expected return is supposed to come later — through decades of taxable income, productivity, and family formation. But if housing makes staying financially irrational, that investment leaves before the return is realised. Most economic models do not really account for this. They tend to treat the future workforce as something fixed. But people move. When staying becomes financially harder than leaving, many will eventually look for a better return elsewhere. Australia is not just risking a lower migration number. It may be risking the return on two decades of public investment in every young person who leaves, while continuing to pay to raise the next generation behind them.
Australia is not the only country facing this problem. Four other developed economies are showing what the same trade-off can look like at different stages — and for largely the same reason.
Canada: The Record No One Wanted
A record 120,016 Canadians permanently emigrated in the 12 months to mid-2025 — the highest number ever recorded and a 26% increase since 2019. The people leaving are disproportionately young and educated. Sixty-seven per cent were aged 20–44, and close to 70% held a university degree. A 2024 Angus Reid Institute survey found that nearly three in ten Canadians (28%) were considering moving out of their home province because of housing costs. In British Columbia and Ontario, that figure rose to around four in ten. Separately, close to two-thirds of surveyed graduate students said they were likely to move abroad after completing their degrees.
The message is fairly clear: when highly educated young people can no longer see a realistic path to building a life where they grew up, some of them start looking elsewhere.
New Zealand: Leaving for the Country Next Door
A record 71,800 New Zealand citizens left in the year to June 2025 — the highest outflow in 13 years. More than a third were under 30. New Zealand’s output per hour worked is below the OECD average, while its house price-to-income ratio is roughly 150% above its own long-term average. The obvious alternative is Australia. Higher-paying and visa-free for New Zealand citizens, Australia has become the default destination for many people looking for better economic prospects.
There is an irony here. Australia’s housing affordability problem can look manageable when compared with New Zealand’s. But that is not exactly a strong defence of Australia’s housing market.
Ireland: Leaving One Unaffordable Country for Another
An estimated 65,600 people left Ireland in the year to April 2025, mostly aged 20–34. A 2025 Youth Forum survey found that 68% of 18-to-35-year-olds were seriously considering leaving within five years, up from 52% two years earlier. Irish house prices passed €320,000 nationally in late 2025, against a median salary of roughly €48,000. And Australia is one of the main destinations for Irish emigrants. Relocations here rose 126% year-on-year.
Young people are leaving one unaffordable country for another because, for now, the wages still make Australia worth the move. That may not remain true forever.
Germany: The Intention, Not Yet the Exodus
Germany has not seen departures on the scale of Canada or New Zealand. But the sentiment is changing. A 2026 Youth in Germany study found that 21% of 14-to-29-year-olds had concrete plans to emigrate, while 41% would consider it in the long term. More than six in ten would not rule out leaving altogether. Housing, job prospects, and financial security were among the reasons cited. Germany may not be experiencing a mass exodus yet. But the question is whether the sentiment comes first — and the departures follow later.
Japan: The Receiving End of the Same Pattern
If Canada, New Zealand, Ireland, and Germany show what happens when housing costs push young people away, Japan shows what it looks like when a country actively tries to attract them.
Japan is facing its own demographic crisis, but from the opposite direction. Prefectures such as Akita, Shimane, and Kochi have lost between 20% and 30% of their populations. So Japan has spent the past few years making it easier for some foreigners to move there.
In March 2024, it launched its first Digital Nomad Visa, allowing eligible foreigners — including Australians — to live in Japan for up to six months while working remotely for an overseas employer.
The housing situation is even more striking. Japan has millions of akiya, or abandoned homes, which foreigners can legally purchase. Some are available through municipal “akiya bank” programmes for very little money, while others sell for roughly US$35,000. Municipalities are also offering cash incentives, renovation grants, and tax reductions to attract young families and international residents. The result?
Japan’s foreign-resident population reached a record 4.12 million at the end of 2025, up 9.5% and marking the fourth consecutive annual record.
While Australia and other countries are watching young people question whether staying is worth it, Japan is actively trying to attract the same kind of mobile population.
Why This Eventually Shows Up in the Birth Rate Too
There is a second effect that may be even more important. Housing is not just pushing some young people out of countries. It is also delaying — or, in some cases, changing — the decision to start a family.
The European Commission’s Joint Research Centre reported in July 2026 that the EU’s population, currently around 450.6 million, is projected to fall to around 445 million by 2050, with one in three residents aged 65 or older. By 2100, it could fall to 398.8 million — a level last seen in the 1970s.
Low fertility and an ageing population are usually treated as separate demographic problems. But fertility does not decline in a vacuum. Housing is often one of the first barriers young adults face. If they cannot afford to move out, rent independently, or buy a home, other life decisions get pushed further into the future.
Ireland’s data shows part of this pattern. Young people now leave home at nearly 27, compared with 25 in the mid-2000s. That may sound like a small change. But when moving out is delayed, other milestones can be delayed too — relationships, marriage, having children, and building a stable household. A country that makes housing unreachable does not just risk losing young workers to other countries. It may also see fewer families formed and a faster ageing of the population that remains.
Migration can help offset some of the pressure on the labour market. That is one reason countries such as Australia continue to attract migrants.
But migration cannot fully replace the families and future generations that might have been formed by people who leave before they have the chance to build their lives at home. Perhaps the more useful question for Australia is not simply how many people are moving here.
It is what it means that more than half of an entire generation would consider leaving — even though the departure numbers have not caught up with that sentiment yet. What happens if they do?
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Natalie Goretski is the founder of iViser Academy, an online financial education platform helping high-income professionals build structured, AI-powered financial systems.
Sources:
Home in Place, “The Exit Generation” survey (November 2025): https://homeinplace.org/the-exit-generation/
Australian Bureau of Statistics, Overseas Migration, 2024–25: https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/people/population/overseas-
migration/latest-release
Statistics Canada emigration data, via Better Dwelling: https://betterdwelling.com/canadians-are-leaving-in-record-
numbers-most-are-prime-aged-workers/
Stats NZ, International Migration: June 2025: https://www.stats.govt.nz/information-releases/international-
migration-june-2025/
Central Statistics Office Ireland, Population and Migration
Estimates, April 2025: https://www.cso.ie/en/releasesandpublications/ep/p-
pme/populationandmigrationestimatesapril2025/keyfindings
“Youth in Germany 2026” study, via The Local Germany: https://www.thelocal.de/20260327/crisis-mode-why-are-so-
many-young-people-thinking-of-leaving-germany
European Commission Joint Research Centre demographic report, https://joint-research-centre.ec.europa.eu/jrc-news-and-updates/demographic-transformation-eu-challenges-and-opportunities-2026-07-14_en?utm_source
Japan Digital Nomad Visa overview, Global Compliance News: https://www.globalcompliancenews.com/2024/09/18/https-
insightplus-bakermckenzie-com-bm-employment-
compensation-japan-launch-of-digital-nomad-visa-effective-31-march-2024_09052024/
Japan akiya (abandoned house) foreign buyer trend, Business
Traveller: https://www.businesstraveller.com/insights/features/japan-
akiya-boom-buying-abandoned-homes/
Japan foreign resident population record, The Japan Times: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/03/28/japan/society/japan-
foreign-resident-population-record/
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