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Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talk zed B.

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Speaker 1: Follow this and our wide range of podcasts now on iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: We're joined by Liam Dan, New Zealand Herald Business Editor

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Speaker 2: at Large. So, as part of your Inside Economics column

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Speaker 2: in the New Zealand Heralds, you've done some digging into

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Speaker 2: the migrant numbers and a figure there that is of

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Speaker 2: relative concern is the age group of twenty five to

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Speaker 2: forty six year old appearing to be leaving the country

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Speaker 2: in significant numbers at the moment.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: So the stems from on Tuesday, I think it was,

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Speaker 3: we got the numbers from statsn Z for Kiwi's leaving

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Speaker 3: you know, migration data, and it showed they had they

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Speaker 3: highlighted some age statistics that showed a lot of young

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Speaker 3: people leaving. You know, the peak age for New Zealanders

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Speaker 3: leaving the country is twenty five. And I put that

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Speaker 3: in the headline and that was the story. But then

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Speaker 3: I did a bit more digging and kind of realized

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Speaker 3: that those numbers, while they are at you know, a

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Speaker 3: high number, are always pretty high, so that the variance

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Speaker 3: isn't that much. If you go back to twenty eleven,

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Speaker 3: you know, people are going on their oe at that time.

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Speaker 3: So how to look at the other numbers from the

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Speaker 3: ages of from about twenty five on through to about

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Speaker 3: forty six, that's where the numbers are at record levels

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Speaker 3: and are much higher than they were in previous years.

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Speaker 3: And that concerns me a bit because those are people

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Speaker 3: that aren't probably going for an oe adventurous sort of

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Speaker 3: trip around Southeast Asia and then wash up in London

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Speaker 3: and work in a pub. Those are people who are

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Speaker 3: skilled people who have been educated here and are leaving

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Speaker 3: because they need better work opportunities and economic opportunities.

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Speaker 4: And that's not great from a crown revenue perspective, is

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Speaker 4: it that particular cohort of New Zealander is leaving.

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Speaker 3: No, Well, they are bigger, they earn more tag we

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Speaker 3: as we get older, we tend to pay earn more

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Speaker 3: and pay more tax, so you can see why that's

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Speaker 3: digging a bit of a hole in the crown revenue.

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Speaker 3: So yep, but we've still got a net migration gain,

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Speaker 3: which means that there are still some Keiwis coming home

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Speaker 3: and migrants coming into the country. But that's dropping away

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Speaker 3: really fast. But also it's harder to get the you know,

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Speaker 3: the skills mixed there. The government's talked a lot about,

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Speaker 3: you know, really trying to up the openness of New

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Speaker 3: Zealand to skilled migrants because we're you know, in dire

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Speaker 3: need of engineers and doctors and all those sort of people.

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Speaker 3: But it sounds like we are losing a lot right now.

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Speaker 4: Well, people in their thirties and forties tend to more

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Speaker 4: likely to have children as well, and so you move

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Speaker 4: your children over to another country, they start going to

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Speaker 4: an Australian school that get Australian accents, and what you've

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Speaker 4: got some Australians as opposed to the normal thing that

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Speaker 4: I think a lot of us did. We went overseas

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Speaker 4: and then got pregnant and then came back because we

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Speaker 4: thought this was the place to bring up our kids.

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Speaker 4: But all of a sudden, you've got Australian kids and

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Speaker 4: they're going to Australian and schools or English or wherever

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Speaker 4: you go, and then you've got serious roots in that

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Speaker 4: country that's going to make it less likely to come home.

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Speaker 3: And yeah, I think if you're going in your mid

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Speaker 3: mid or early forties, you're probably going because you've got

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Speaker 3: something lined up, you know. So the opportunity is there.

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Speaker 3: You don't sort of just yeah, yeah, which you know, look,

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Speaker 3: look great. It's great that it's been a tradition and

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Speaker 3: still is a tradition. And you'd expect high numbers of

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Speaker 3: Kiwis heading off on the oe, the younger Kiwi's, you know,

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Speaker 3: because they were you know, stuck here for four years

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Speaker 3: with um and dad and all that sort of stuff

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Speaker 3: through COVID, and so it makes sense there was a

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Speaker 3: bulge there. But look, I know that, you know, anecdotally,

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Speaker 3: we know that this is a problem, but it just

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Speaker 3: sort of confirms that it is real. I've had a

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Speaker 3: look at the comments online. There's a lot of debate

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Speaker 3: about what's driving it. I think for me, primarily it

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Speaker 3: would be the economics of it. Jobs, you know, unemployments,

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Speaker 3: rising wages, you know, higher wages, and so I think

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Speaker 3: economics is at the root of why people migrate. I

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Speaker 3: have noticed a lot of comments saying that New Zealand's

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Speaker 3: got too woke and all that sort of stuff too.

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Speaker 3: There's that sort of cultural debate, but I'm not sure

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Speaker 3: where you go around the world.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, we'll wait, wait to you land in Sydney.

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Speaker 2: Experience for exactly and money talks. Isn't it right? If

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Speaker 2: you're in that age cohort and you've got a particular

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Speaker 2: position which is quite high up, and you get off

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Speaker 2: at double your salary in Australia or further abroad, what

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Speaker 2: are you going to do? You're gonna have that conversation say,

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Speaker 2: is it worth up routing here, pulling the kids out

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Speaker 2: of school and sitting up shop in Australia.

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Speaker 4: Well, I was in Memphis not so long ago, and

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Speaker 4: we were driving around these suburbs and we're pointing at

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Speaker 4: these mansions and that, and I asked that our driver,

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Speaker 4: you know, oh well, how much do you pay for those?

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Speaker 4: And he said it's insane, you can't afford them. That

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Speaker 4: that house was giant, looked like the White House. That's

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Speaker 4: five hundred thousand. So I mean house prices.

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Speaker 3: If you can trade in the house in Auckland and

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Speaker 3: get a mention in Memphis, and you've got the skills

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Speaker 3: that Memphis wants. I don't know what country.

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Speaker 4: Music, but if you're going to go to America, you

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Speaker 4: just have to do it the right way. Don't walk

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Speaker 4: over the border, or else you'll have ice knocking on

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Speaker 4: your door and having you out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, there is that as well, Liam, Thank you very much.

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Speaker 2: If you want to check out the column, it's Inside Economics.

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Speaker 2: It's on the New Zealand Herald and well worth a read.

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