International Students

The ABC’s Jacob Greber claims that the international education sector is an “export giant” that is being unfairly targeted by the federal government’s desire to lower net overseas migration.

Justin Fabo at Antipodean Macro has compiled data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) showing that the unemployment rate for recent arrivals to Australia surged to around 8% in Q3, up from around 5% at the trough.

The e61 Institute has published an interesting report examining so-called “visa hopping” by international students to extend their stays in Australia.

Following a strategic review of the student visa program in 2011 (the “Knight Review”), the Gillard government significantly enhanced employment rights for graduate (485) visas in 2013.

The AFR this week reported that the number of temporary migrants in Australia spiked by around 100,000 in the past year, with the volume of student visas surging to an all-time high 679,293 at the end of August.

Preliminary data reported in The SMH shows that the number of offshore student visa applications fell to 18,697 in July, compared with 36,207 during the same period in 2023.

For many years, MB has argued that the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ (ABS) estimate of the export of education is exaggerated because it incorrectly included income from international students working in Australia.

Earlier this month, the chair of Australia’s National Housing Supply and Affordability Council, Susan Lloyd-Hurwitz, attacked the federal government’s international student caps and downplayed their impact on the rental market by citing spurious Student Accommodation Council (SAC) report.

The Australian’s Stephen Matchett has written an interesting article on the barriers Australian universities face when opening campuses offshore.

In 2022, Claire Field, a former vocational training sector regulator, warned that a large number of South Asian students were arriving in Australia in “response to the unlimited work rights now available to those on Australian student visas”, enrolling in “lower quality and cheaper vocational colleges” to enter Australia to live and work.

In 2019, the United Nations accused Blackstone, the world’s largest private real estate manager with $470 billion on its platform, of “wreaking havoc” in communities and contributing to the global housing crisis by increasing rents and “aggressive evictions”.

Australian Industry Group (AiG) CEO Innes Willox has broken rank from the other business lobbies and rejected the notion that international students are the key to Australia’s future.

For decades, spurious private colleges have provided backdoor immigration and work rights to internationals “students” seeking migration to Australia.

The chair of Australia’s National Housing Supply and Affordability Council, Susan Lloyd-Hurwitz, attacked the government’s planned caps for international students, claiming that it won’t ease the rental crisis and will endanger Australia’s second-largest export industry.

Universities Australia chair David Lloyd continues to spread the lie that international education is Australia’s second largest export.

Immigration influencer Abul Rizvi has inadvertently admitted that Australia’s higher education “industry” is not selling education.

I have always described the higher education industry as the “middleman” of Australia’s immigration ponzi, effectively ‘clipping the ticket’ and privatising the gains from high numbers of foreign students while socialising the costs on the broader economy.

For years, we have been fed the lie that international education is Australia’s fourth largest export, worth a fantastical $48 billion a year.

For years, I have called on the federal government to crack down on the international education sector via the following types of reforms: Raise financial barriers to entry (i.e., how much funds a student must have available before arriving in Australia). Significantly increase entrance requirements (e.g. English language proficiency and academic testing).