The Kiwi component

We extract the data of how Kiwi citizens move in and out of New Zealand compared with overall permanent migrant data, and look at these major flows in their longer term context, including by region

22nd Jul 17, 9:36am by David Chaston

The usual focus from our migration statistics is the net level of new migrants we are attracting.

But that data is a mix of foreigners applying to come here, and New Zealand citizens returning.

The net of these is now running at a fast pace of inbound migration, totalling 72,305 over the past year.

But included in this are permanent movements by New Zealanders; this analysis focuses on them (us).

Migration by Kiwis has always been a 'canary in the mine' for how we assess our forward economic prospects.

Leaving for an OE is a rite of passage for young Kiwis, but leaving to overcome economic stress is another powerful reason.

The country's risk is that not everyone returns; we lose some bright, go-getter people this way.

But in the year to June 2017, that net outflow has been reduced to a very small trickle. In fact it is now at its lowest flow in over 30 years. The last time it was this low was in February 1984. (And I was a part of the returning group, enthusiastic about New Zealand's prospects after the rapid reforms that flowed out of that era-changing 1984 election.)

But reform at that time was not painless, even if many accepted it was necessary and inevitable.

Fast forward to 2017, and we have a situation where we are seeing record numbers of our citizens returning.

This flow has never been as high.

The following chart tracks citizens who are returning permanenty (and excludes returning visitors). "Permanently' is as described on arrival cards, and is for those who say they are returning for 12 months or more.

All data in the following charts and table are from Statiscs New Zealand's Infoshare resource.

Going the other way are 'departures', defined the same way.

Citizens are not leaving in the numbers they used to. The number for the year to June 2017 is now the lowest since September 1994, the least in 23 years.

Here is the impact of net migration by New Zealand citizens on some key, large regions, colour-coded for the changing National / Labour / National governments:

year to June	Auckland	Waikato	BofP	Wellington	Canterbury	New Zealand

1992	-3,662	-629	-245	-1,671	-564	-8,375
1993	-3,170	-577	-417	-1,842	-914	-8,641
1994	-2,662	-823	-603	-1,912	-843	-9,113
1995	-3,819	-1,141	-668	-2,396	-1,410	-13,214
1996	-5,072	-1,507	-660	-2,845	-1,826	-16,498
1997	-7,297	-1,577	-935	-2,995	-2,440	-20,537
1998	-7,375	-1,766	-1,246	-3,161	-2,652	-22,052
1999	-10,902	-2.860	-2,094	-4,174	-3,605	-31,706
2000	-11,045	-2,797	-2,057	-4,895	-4,121	-32,935
2001	-15,370	-3,327	-2,184	-5,392	-4,210	-41,901
2002	-6,395	-1,479	-1,221	-2,320	-2,018	-19,908
2003	-3,449	-1,015	-844	-1.376	-883	-11,493
2004	-4,909	-1,171	-1,123	-1,520	-864	-15,039
2005	-7,227	-1,890	-1,788	-2,464	-1,901	-22,423
2006	-7,434	-2,152	-1,852	-2,565	-2,348	-23,734
2007	-9,026	-2,451	-2,052	-2,859	-2,774	-28,370
2008	-11,420	-3,021	-2,651	-3,682	-3,517	-35,291
2009	-9,409	-2,561	-2,192	-2,679	-2,607	-27,659
2010	-5,603	-1,367	-1,078	-1,323	-1.174	-14,236
2011	-9,464	-2,785	-2,205	-2,879	-3,712	-29,904
2012	-12,456	-3,579	-2,990	-3,708	-4,447	-39,507
2013	-12,438	-2,964	-2,278	-3,243	-1,901	-31,741
2014	-5,634	-886	-780	-1,746	-299	-12,058
2015	-3,489	-118	-68	-1,268	-174	-5,644
2016	-3,414	+87	+327	-785	-67	-3,139
2017	-2,486	+146	+331	-599	+144	-1,284

You can look at this data and see the effects on migration from some major changes to the economic landscape, like

- bringing in a new top rate of income tax at 39% in 1999, (which also arguably incentivised investor real estate decisions to chase tax-free capital gains),

- the 2008 global financial crisis,

- the 2011 Christchurch earthquakes,

- the housing affordability stresses, especially in Auckland, that started to become particularly acute in 2014.

There may be others.

But by any measure, New Zealanders are not voting with their feet to leave with anywhere near the same conviction in 2017 as they did in 2001, 2008 or 2012.

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21 Comments

by Fritz | 22nd Jul 17, 10:28am 1500676123

Without some nasty economic disaster that disproportionately affects NZ (major Wellington earthquake or a property crash decoupled from Australia) I think we have a long term structural change in the movement of kiwis.
Aussie's boom is over and they have made policy changes that make the country less appealling to kiwis.
Similarly the UK offers less attractive opportunity for a host of reasons.

by Foxglove. | 22nd Jul 17, 11:09am 1500678558

The Rudd government scuttled Australia's economy & yes because of the flow on from that, Aussie is certainly less appealing nowadays. Whether you like them or not Cullen and then English ran as a responsible ship that could be wished for. Be that as it may, it's a troubled world out there & it is no surprise that NZ'rs are rethinking their personal & family security and NZ, parked out here on the extremities, looks to still be a pretty good haven. At the time of Brexit & then Trump, there were reports in our media that enquiries to our foreign offices regarding immigration to NZ had hit record peaks. Interested to know if this actually translated into anything that was material.

by sharetrader | 22nd Jul 17, 1:05pm 1500685512

yes I would like to see the to from graph overlay, I suspect economy, conditions and environment in Australia have a massive influence.

by Foxglove. | 22nd Jul 17, 1:22pm 1500686556

Yes and also the rest of the world. Let's say actual hostilities commencing between Qatar and her neighbours. A move by Putin on a Baltic state. Another collapse of a big Wall St financial institute. Any of those will have a bigger & further reaching impact on people's thoughts about NZ than any policy, good or bad, that a NZ government can implement.

by bob atkinson | 22nd Jul 17, 6:12pm 1500703972

If those figures are true then roughly one in twenty [**NB this is an edit - I had in error written five not twenty**] Auckland Kiwis left in the last decade. And that isn't including the Aucklanders who are moving to other NZ cities. A dramatic exodus. We have to accept change but is there a danger that Auckland will end up alien and unrecognisable to the rest of the country?

I wonder how many are like myself: immigrant buying a house in 2003, citizen five years later, and if it wasn't for my family I would be cashing up my house (massive profit) and moving to a smaller NZ city. [ No desire to return to the UK except for holidays.]
Many of our young immigrants may be moving on for economic reasons - they know a good graduate can earn more money overseas - and if so are the relatively unskilled immigrants being left behind to take all the low paid jobs ?

by David George | 22nd Jul 17, 11:39am 1500680387

Yes.
For me one of the most disappointing aspects of the recent immigration trends is the LACK of returning Kiwis.
We share a common labour market with Australia and have hundreds of thousands of Kiwis over there - most of them capable, qualified and hard working yet they are still not returning home at a rate greater than those leaving.
"Our" decision to undermine wages here with bulk, poor quality immigration is largely to blame. Many of my children's friends are over there and earning substantially more than they would here with mostly lower costs. It's a tragedy with broken up families and social cohesion going down the drain.

by David Chaston | 22nd Jul 17, 2:58pm 1500692308

"One in five ... in the last decade" ... ?? "A dramatic exodus." ??

You might be misreading the data.

In 2006 the Auckland population was 1,373,000.

The data above says 82,300 citizens left over the next ten years

in 2016 the Auckland population was 1,569,900.

Simple math says the leaving rate is -6%, one in 17.

While at the same time a net 279,200 arrived in the region. Most of those will be from other parts of the country. Nationally the country's population grew by 508,100 and we welcomed a net 190,900 immigrants.

None of that come anywhere nedar "one in five".

by KH | 22nd Jul 17, 3:30pm 1500694238

Are you sure DC >> ".......While at the same time a net 279,200 arrived in the region. Most of those will be from other parts of the country......." My understanding was that the NZ net internal migration was out of Auckland. Maybe not much but still net out.

by David Chaston | 22nd Jul 17, 7:03pm 1500707023

Even if every last one of the net migrants went to Auckland, that must mean the other 90,000 came locally. Of course it will be more than that because not every migrant went to Auckland. Even with a 1.5% birth rate in Auckland (high), that is only 20,000 or so in that decade. So at a very minimum, more than 80,000 people moved to Auckland from other NZ regions in the time period we are talking about.

No evidence from the numbers to the end of 2016 that there is a net outflow from the Queen City.

by David George | 22nd Jul 17, 5:41pm 1500702068

There seems to be a hell of a lot of Auckland refugees around here with a real surge over the past 3 years or so. That's just my observation; how are the internal migration figures worked out? Obviously the census will give an accurate figure but that's not till next year; be interesting to see what has been really going on.

by KH | 23rd Jul 17, 5:17pm 1500787072

Hi DC. I dug up the link below about internal migration. Bit old (2006) but it seems to me better to rely on census figures rather than calculate internal migration from over the border numbers.
http://www.stats.govt.nz/browse_for_stats/population/Migration/internal…
I generally like to quote this because the Auckland-centric commentators here assume all of New Zealand is busting to get into Auckland for jobs.(maybe it's the only place the commentators can find jobs ? And that irritates because the 'provinces' are doing so well for many folk.
Yes maybe there is an inflow into Auckland this year, but net it's probably very very small.

by bob atkinson | 22nd Jul 17, 6:03pm 1500703428

David: Humble apologies and thank you for noticing it. - a maths mistake - I divided and the answer was 20 and I put that as a percentage whereas it is of course one in twenty or 5%. Apologies for my stupidity. And it does rather destroy my argument. Auckland is certainly changing but not that fast.

by Zombie ponzi | 22nd Jul 17, 12:32pm 1500683534

That's the story in our family. My wife and I, my brother-in-law, my sister and her partner - all kiwi citizens who have returned in the past 5 months from years overseas. Not one of us has come here for economic prospects, in fact we've all had to take big pay/opportunity cuts. We've come back for family.

by bob atkinson | 22nd Jul 17, 1:42pm 1500687744

If you are a Kiwi you have no problem reuniting with your Kiwi family. Unless you are a highly successful productive Kiwi who has foreign parents even if they and you have considerable wealth - then it is no joy because one year ago the Dept of Immigration without public debate just froze the immigration family reunion category that had been active for years.
This is all part of an immigration debate that we are not permitted to have (ref Little & Shaw going quiet and even Winston hasn't published actual details for discussion.) It is proof that our government sees immigration in terms of making GDP appear good and giving businesses 3rd world wages but doesn't concern itself with real people in loving families.
Can they get away with it because most of the solitary elderly parents are Chinese? But it can hit any family of non-NZ origin; for example Scots returning to the UK because their parents are getting very frail.

by sharetrader | 22nd Jul 17, 2:46pm 1500691590

another overlay I would love to see is born in NZ against non born in NZ citizens leaving and returning.

by KH | 22nd Jul 17, 3:37pm 1500694657

Good question. My anecdotal understanding is that quite a few achieve NZ citizenship, then use to to move elsewhere, often Australia.
Then that reminds me of the other debate about all the New Zealanders in Australia. While they might be NZ citizens, there is a view that many were not born in New Zealand. Also wonder how many of then are in that category.

by kiwichas | 22nd Jul 17, 3:27pm 1500694069

So still more Kiwi are leaving than returning....is what he is trying to say.

by Carlos67 | 22nd Jul 17, 5:00pm 1500699647

Basically this is a record return rate not seen since 1984 if you look at the graph. The rest of the world is turning to shit compared to New Zealand. You want to be living in a place outside ballistic missile range and somewhere that doesn't boarder another country because they come pouring in after they wreck theirs and start looking for a better one.

by bob atkinson | 22nd Jul 17, 6:11pm 1500703877

I would phrase it differently - despite NZ's economic decline relative to most other countries it remains a very pleasant country to live in especially if you can afford to bring up a family. Other countries can be very pleasant (which explains why Kiwis have such long OEs) but NZ has space and a good lifestyle and is less divided by class, religion and ethnicity than most other countries.
However many people are moved to post to these blogs because they are concerned about the direction we are heading.

by russellj | 22nd Jul 17, 5:27pm 1500701247

I had a look at the NZ Stats website as I find the incoming stats confusing - the 73,000 long term arrivals does not include short term (obviously) but these seem to number at least 200,000 temp wrk permits, students (who can legally work 20 hrs a week) all of whom have to be housed for say 12/24 months even if they do then go home. Why aren't these numbers relevant to the housing crisis??

by areyouserious | 23rd Jul 17, 12:31am 1500726665

I suspect the answer lies in my generation, Australia was BOOMING but now we have or are starting families. We saw easy money in Australia, it's no longer easy money. Do we want or children to grow up as Australians? At home we have the kiwi way of life and the social security that wasn't available to tax paying kiwis living in Australia.