Here's what the booming population REALLY means for our economy

It’s not the size of Australia’s population that matters, it is how our 25 million people are located throughout the 7.7 million square kilometres that is relevant to judgments about the ideal level and growth rate of population.

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Many will consider Australia’s population growth to be too high while ever there are pockets of densely settled population with dreadful transport congestion, where housing is considered to be unaffordable by some because too many people want the few houses to either rent or buy and while Australia’s industry base is concentrated in both what we produce and where it is located.

Right now, the bulk of Australia’s 25 million people are concentrated in a relatively small area, where transport facilities are clogged by cars and trucks and where the public sector transport infrastructure is old, inefficient and doesn’t go to places where people may otherwise chose to live.

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Many people bemoan the cost of housing in areas where they want to live, with rents and prices being driven higher by excess demand. And when new land for housing is released, it often has poor transport and social infrastructure near it which is why few people want to live in these new suburbs.

Now think of an alternative.

What about an area where sufficient houses are built that are well serviced by infrastructure, social services and employment opportunities? People would undoubtedly flock there and away from the over-crowded cities to take advantage of the lifestyle opportunities.

Germany has a population of over 82 million people and a land mass of just 357,000 square kilometres. This means that Germany has more than three times Australia’s population on less than one-twentieth of the land mass.

And yet it has a pubic transport system of rare efficiency. Housing affordability is widely considered to be reasonable and there are jobs in the dozens of medium sized cities, ensuring geographically diverse opportunities for the population.

What is Germany doing so well, that we in Australia aren’t, at least in terms of a high population/high standard of living dynamic?

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The answers are remarkably simple.

It has undertaken infrastructure investment in transport, cities and services which means there are 39 cities with a population of 200,000 or more, with only one city, Berlin, with a population over 2 million. The population is widely dispersed across the country.

This limits congestion and all the issues we frequently hear Sydney-siders and Melbourne-ites complain about in their mega cities.

Australia, with its smaller population and massive land mass, has four cities with more than 2 million people, with Sydney and Melbourne having 10 million between them. The eight largest German cities have a total population less than Sydney and Melbourne combined.

It appears it is all about decentralisation.

The issue for many Australians is, quite clearly, the smaller cities that have affordable housing are dogged by an absence of job opportunities, substandard services such as schools, health care and public transport and as a result, they languish while the big cities groan under the stress of huge population levels.

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If Australia is to happily sustain the next lift up in population, to 30 million around about 2030 on current estimates, there needs to be a concerted effort by the government, in concert with the private sector, to build and develop high quality infrastructure and services well away from Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane.

Jobs and other opportunities could follow.

Perhaps then the current big cities will have time to catch-up with infrastructure, services and housing whilst other regional centres, which are willing and able to accommodate more people, can start to flourish.

Let’s hope so for the sake of the future new Australians and the 25 million who live here today.