"we do like to be beside the seaside"
Jul 9th 2003, 1:27 pm
#1
Guest
Posts: n/a
"we do like to be beside the seaside"
Thought I'd practise my Pommy "Crl-C Crl-V" Bastard skills.
CONCLUSIONS from this report in the Sydney Morning Herald
1) Population is growing at the rate of 1.2 per cent a year, less than half the rate during the baby boom after World War II.
2) everyone's moving to QLD coast - the rate of growth of the centre of population is 1 kilometre a year..
3) 85pc of the population of Aus are 30 miles near the coast - part of the land rush
4) Migration counts for 45pc odd of Aus's annual population increase.
Oh, how we do love to be beside the seaside
July 9 2003
Australians, it seems, are moving en masse to the Queensland coast - or any piece of beach, writes Ross Gittins.
Do you remember the census form you filled in almost two years ago in August 2001? After months of totting up, the Bureau of Statistics has released its results for the growth and distribution of the population. They contain a few surprises.
The point that stands out for me, however, is the one the demographer Bernard Salt makes: that we're moving to the coast and moving to Queensland.
The census found the population had reached 19.4 million, which means it quintupled over the 20th century from the 3.8 million we had in 1901. It's growing at the rate of 1.2 per cent a year, less than half the rate during the baby boom after World War II.
If you think the Howard Government has cut back hard on immigration, this may surprise you: natural increase - births minus deaths - accounts for only a bit more than half our population growth, leaving net migration still accounting for 43 per cent of it.
And if all the stories about the decline of country towns have left you with the impression that people are crowding into the capital cities, here's another surprise. The proportion of the population living in the eight state and territory capitals was unchanged over the 10 years to 2001 at 64 per cent.
No, what's increasing is the proportion living within 50 kilometres of the coast. It's now up to 85 per cent.
Tasmania being an island, it's proportion is 99.5 per cent. Then come South Australia (92 per cent), Western Australia (91), Queensland (88), NSW (85), Victoria (83), Northern Territory (66) and the ACT, zero.
If Australia's population were spread evenly across the continent, our "centre of population" - the population's average latitude and longitude - would presumably be somewhere near Alice Springs.
In fact, our heavy concentration of people on the eastern seaboard means that the only other major concentration - on the south- west seaboard, around Perth - is able to drag the population centre only as far west as near Cobar in NSW.
But here's the bit I like: the central point is heading up towards Queensland at the rate of about a kilometre a year.
In any story about population growth, Queensland - home of my ancestors - always wins. It grew by 1.7 per cent a year in the five years between censuses, with only Western Australia coming close at 1.5 per cent.
As usual, NSW grew at the national average rate of 1.2 per cent, with Victoria managing (a much improved) 1.1 per cent.
But South Australia grew by only 0.5 per cent a year and Tasmania actually went backwards at the rate of 0.1 per cent a year.
So how are the banana-benders doing it? They have the second highest rate of natural increase after the West Australians, but they don't do as well from net overseas migration.
Western Australia gains most from immigration, followed by NSW, Victoria, Queensland and South Australia, with Tasmania bringing up the rear.
No, the secret of Queensland's success is interstate migration. In the five years between the 1996 and 2001 censuses, Queensland was the one overwhelming winner among the states.
The West Australians gained a little and the Victorians held their own (a big improvement on their outward drain between 1991 and 1996), but NSW, South Australia and, in particular, Tasmania suffered significant net losses to other states.
All told over the five years, Queensland made a net gain from the rest of the country of more than 92,000. Almost two-thirds of those people came from NSW and about 13 per cent from Victoria, but the Queenslanders made a net population gain from every other state and territory.
You can see we're a more mobile lot than many of us imagine. It turns out that, over the five years between the censuses, no fewer than 42 per cent of us moved house.
Most of that was movement within the same city or state, of course. But of all those who moved, 11 per cent changed state.
So where does all this leave the states' pecking order, population-wise? NSW's share of the nation's total population is down to barely a third and Victoria's is down to a fraction under a quarter.
Next comes Queensland on 19 per cent, Western Australia on 10 per cent, South Australia on 8 per cent and Tasmania on a bit over 2 per cent.
In the census of 1981, the gap between the second biggest state, Victoria, and the third, Queensland, was almost 11 percentage points. Now it's six.
To oversimplify a bit, in the 20 years to 2001 Queensland's share of the total population increased by three percentage points, while NSW and Victoria lost that much between them.
Western Australia gained about one percentage point, while South Australia lost a percentage point. And Tasmania lost 0.5 percentage points, while the two territories gained about that much.
This will test your knowledge of not-so-trivial trivia: what proportion of the population do Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders make up?
Overall, 2.4 per cent. The proportion varies considerably between states, however, from as little as 0.6 per cent in Victoria and 1.7 per cent in South Australia, to about 3.5 per cent in Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania and almost 29 per cent in the Northern Territory.
Even so, the Territory accounts for only 12 per cent of our total indigenous population. NSW has the most with 29 per cent, followed by Queensland (27 per cent) and Western Australia (14 per cent).
By contrast with the 460,000 indigenes who can claim to have been here longest, just under a quarter of the population - 4.1 million - were born overseas. People from Europe account for just over half of these, with people from all parts of Asia making up a quarter.
This means the Brits outnumber indigenous by more than two to one, and we have almost as many Kiwis as we do indigenous.
I dunno about you, but I'd never thought of it like that before.
CONCLUSIONS from this report in the Sydney Morning Herald
1) Population is growing at the rate of 1.2 per cent a year, less than half the rate during the baby boom after World War II.
2) everyone's moving to QLD coast - the rate of growth of the centre of population is 1 kilometre a year..
3) 85pc of the population of Aus are 30 miles near the coast - part of the land rush
4) Migration counts for 45pc odd of Aus's annual population increase.
Oh, how we do love to be beside the seaside
July 9 2003
Australians, it seems, are moving en masse to the Queensland coast - or any piece of beach, writes Ross Gittins.
Do you remember the census form you filled in almost two years ago in August 2001? After months of totting up, the Bureau of Statistics has released its results for the growth and distribution of the population. They contain a few surprises.
The point that stands out for me, however, is the one the demographer Bernard Salt makes: that we're moving to the coast and moving to Queensland.
The census found the population had reached 19.4 million, which means it quintupled over the 20th century from the 3.8 million we had in 1901. It's growing at the rate of 1.2 per cent a year, less than half the rate during the baby boom after World War II.
If you think the Howard Government has cut back hard on immigration, this may surprise you: natural increase - births minus deaths - accounts for only a bit more than half our population growth, leaving net migration still accounting for 43 per cent of it.
And if all the stories about the decline of country towns have left you with the impression that people are crowding into the capital cities, here's another surprise. The proportion of the population living in the eight state and territory capitals was unchanged over the 10 years to 2001 at 64 per cent.
No, what's increasing is the proportion living within 50 kilometres of the coast. It's now up to 85 per cent.
Tasmania being an island, it's proportion is 99.5 per cent. Then come South Australia (92 per cent), Western Australia (91), Queensland (88), NSW (85), Victoria (83), Northern Territory (66) and the ACT, zero.
If Australia's population were spread evenly across the continent, our "centre of population" - the population's average latitude and longitude - would presumably be somewhere near Alice Springs.
In fact, our heavy concentration of people on the eastern seaboard means that the only other major concentration - on the south- west seaboard, around Perth - is able to drag the population centre only as far west as near Cobar in NSW.
But here's the bit I like: the central point is heading up towards Queensland at the rate of about a kilometre a year.
In any story about population growth, Queensland - home of my ancestors - always wins. It grew by 1.7 per cent a year in the five years between censuses, with only Western Australia coming close at 1.5 per cent.
As usual, NSW grew at the national average rate of 1.2 per cent, with Victoria managing (a much improved) 1.1 per cent.
But South Australia grew by only 0.5 per cent a year and Tasmania actually went backwards at the rate of 0.1 per cent a year.
So how are the banana-benders doing it? They have the second highest rate of natural increase after the West Australians, but they don't do as well from net overseas migration.
Western Australia gains most from immigration, followed by NSW, Victoria, Queensland and South Australia, with Tasmania bringing up the rear.
No, the secret of Queensland's success is interstate migration. In the five years between the 1996 and 2001 censuses, Queensland was the one overwhelming winner among the states.
The West Australians gained a little and the Victorians held their own (a big improvement on their outward drain between 1991 and 1996), but NSW, South Australia and, in particular, Tasmania suffered significant net losses to other states.
All told over the five years, Queensland made a net gain from the rest of the country of more than 92,000. Almost two-thirds of those people came from NSW and about 13 per cent from Victoria, but the Queenslanders made a net population gain from every other state and territory.
You can see we're a more mobile lot than many of us imagine. It turns out that, over the five years between the censuses, no fewer than 42 per cent of us moved house.
Most of that was movement within the same city or state, of course. But of all those who moved, 11 per cent changed state.
So where does all this leave the states' pecking order, population-wise? NSW's share of the nation's total population is down to barely a third and Victoria's is down to a fraction under a quarter.
Next comes Queensland on 19 per cent, Western Australia on 10 per cent, South Australia on 8 per cent and Tasmania on a bit over 2 per cent.
In the census of 1981, the gap between the second biggest state, Victoria, and the third, Queensland, was almost 11 percentage points. Now it's six.
To oversimplify a bit, in the 20 years to 2001 Queensland's share of the total population increased by three percentage points, while NSW and Victoria lost that much between them.
Western Australia gained about one percentage point, while South Australia lost a percentage point. And Tasmania lost 0.5 percentage points, while the two territories gained about that much.
This will test your knowledge of not-so-trivial trivia: what proportion of the population do Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders make up?
Overall, 2.4 per cent. The proportion varies considerably between states, however, from as little as 0.6 per cent in Victoria and 1.7 per cent in South Australia, to about 3.5 per cent in Queensland, Western Australia and Tasmania and almost 29 per cent in the Northern Territory.
Even so, the Territory accounts for only 12 per cent of our total indigenous population. NSW has the most with 29 per cent, followed by Queensland (27 per cent) and Western Australia (14 per cent).
By contrast with the 460,000 indigenes who can claim to have been here longest, just under a quarter of the population - 4.1 million - were born overseas. People from Europe account for just over half of these, with people from all parts of Asia making up a quarter.
This means the Brits outnumber indigenous by more than two to one, and we have almost as many Kiwis as we do indigenous.
I dunno about you, but I'd never thought of it like that before.
Last edited by badgersmount; Jul 9th 2003 at 1:45 pm.
Jul 9th 2003, 1:42 pm
#2
Forum Regular
Joined: May 2003
Location: South Shields, UK
Posts: 73
Nice stats, I currently live beside the coast at the moment (North East), and would love to live near the coast when I do the big move, although wanna move down to the south east part of Oz.
Marcus
Marcus
Last edited by mrfrosty; Jul 9th 2003 at 1:45 pm.
