Reason more Kiwis than ever before are ditching New Zealand and moving to Australia

An alarming poll has found more than a third of Kiwis have considered moving to Australia in the past year as the low economic outlook drives record numbers abroad.

The number of 80,000 New Zealanders heading abroad in the year to the end of September is at an all-time high, with around half of them estimated to be heading to the happy country.

New Zealand is in the grip of a ‘brain drain’ as young Kiwis look for better jobs, prices and wages across the pond or beyond.

Earlier this month a poll from The mail and Freshwater Strategy found that 37 percent of New Zealand voters (more than a third) had seriously considered emigrating to Australia in the past 12 months.

That’s compared to just 8 percent of Australian voters who have considered moving to New Zealand.

Of Kiwis considering the move, the most represented age group is New Zealanders aged 18 to 35 (55 percent).

In terms of their political preferences, it was Te Pati Maori voters (55 percent) who were most keen to leave, followed by supporters of the libertarian ACT party and the Greens (both 41 percent).

The poll also showed that a collapsing economy was a priority for voters, with 60 percent identifying pressure on the cost of living as their top concern.

Economic commentator Brad Olsen said the data shows monetary pressures are “really starting to kick in” in New Zealand.

“There are clearly a lot more people looking around and thinking about the options for the future,” Olsen said the press.

“Right now, with New Zealand unemployment being higher than Australia’s, a lot of people are looking at those numbers and saying, there are relatively better job opportunities in Australia. I could go out there and shoot my shot.

‘It’s not just singles who take a few years off. We’re seeing more and more families moving en masse to Australia, raising concerns about where our future labor market will lie as New Zealand’s population ages.”

The latest available figure for New Zealand’s unemployment rate is 4.8 percent, while in Australia it is 4.1 percent.

Although record numbers of Kiwis are leaving their home countries, the country still saw a net migration gain of almost 45,000 in September 2024, according to Stats NZ.

But that figure was down from a net migration peak of 136,300 in October 2023.

By contrast, Australia’s net migration in the year to March 2024 was 509,800 people.

New Zealanders can live and work in Australia, and vice versa, through specially created visas.

Last year, the federal government announced that Kiwis who had lived in Australia for at least four years on a special visa could apply for citizenship.

Citizenship comes with a host of benefits, including a social security safety net, access to student loans and the ability to take on a range of public service and defense roles reserved only for Australians.

Kiwis are the fourth largest migrant community in Australia, after China, India and Britain, according to Home Affairs data.

In June 2022, there were approximately 586,020 Kiwis living in Australia – 2.9 percent more than a decade earlier.

Why a hardworking Kiwi couple decided to leave New Zealand to live in Australia

New Zealand couple Tim and Eva Mitchell are in the middle of a year-long trip around the world, but the adventurous Kiwi couple say the only thing that made it possible was leaving their home country to live in Australia.

In 2019, the pair followed the path of thousands of Kiwis across the Tasman in search of higher wages and more career opportunities.

After living just sixteen months in Melbourne, where Eva, 28, worked as an IVF pharmacist and Tim, 33, worked for the same engineering company that employed him in New Zealand, the couple had saved enough to spend a year in to travel abroad.

“If we had stayed in New Zealand we probably wouldn’t have been able to travel – we wouldn’t have been able to save enough,” Eva told Daily Mail Australia from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

“Everyone around the world is struggling, but in New Zealand I think they’re falling behind.”

Better money for Kiwis moving to Australia

She said moving to Australia allowed the couple to earn 30 percent higher wages than at home, and there were many other financial benefits such as tax deductions for work costs that simply didn’t exist in New Zealand.

In their Earn money from traveling blog Eva writes that the couple ‘knew that moving to Australia would mean we could save more money AND save money faster than if we stayed in New Zealand, solely by securing higher paying jobs’.

“What we didn’t realize were the many other ways that living in Australia could facilitate our savings goals, starting with paying less income tax,” she writes.

‘For an average Australian full-time salary of $95,000, you would pay approximately $21,300 in income tax per year.

“In New Zealand, on the same salary (if you can find a job that pays the equivalent) you would have to pay about $23,200 in income tax per year.”

However, that wasn’t even the best part.

“In Australia you have the right to claim back tax on all kinds of work costs,” she said.

‘This includes professional fees, costs for working from home, tools, conference costs, work clothing and much more.

‘Ultimately we discovered that Australia not only pays better; you keep more of what you earn.’

Eva recalled when the couple moved to Australia that “everyone said make sure you get your tax back.”

“As far as we knew, we could never reclaim the same costs in New Zealand, not in normal jobs, maybe if you had a business,” she said.

“The grass is definitely greener.”

More career opportunities

Both Eva and Tim enjoyed career opportunities in Australia that they would not have had in New Zealand.

Eva went from being a pharmacist in a public hospital in Christchurch to working for a private IVF clinic and a private sector pharmacy job that she said didn’t exist in New Zealand.

“My new job came with a raise, bonuses and a small team where I felt valued,” she wrote in the blog.

Even if she had returned to community pharmacy, the pay increase in Australia would have been significant.

Despite working for the same company, Tim was also given ‘a significant pay rise to move to Australia’, which would have taken ‘years’ to obtain in New Zealand.

“Shortly after moving to Australia, Tim was able to secure a role with a higher authority, which is a testament to the career opportunities that Australian companies can offer to New Zealand professionals looking to move to Australia,” Eva wrote.

“In addition to a pay increase, Tim’s transfer deal provided us both with flights to Melbourne and a month of free accommodation in an apartment in Melbourne’s CBD until we could secure our own rental property. Not a bad deal, if I say so myself!’

A better balance between work and private life

As if getting paid more wasn’t enough, Tim and Eva discovered that Australians work shorter hours than Kiwis and that supermarkets are cheaper.

‘The standard working week in New Zealand is 40 hours (compared to 38 in Australia), so over a full year the difference is about 100 hours,’ says Eva.

‘It doesn’t seem like much, two hours a week, but it is, and we found it useful because it gives you time to visit the banks when they are open.’

She also said that in Victoria, ‘seasonal cashbacks on dining out, activities and electricity bills are offered to all residents’.

“Thanks to these cashback schemes, we were reimbursed hundreds of dollars during our time living in Melbourne,” she wrote.

Eva and Tim also loved living in Melbourne, which has about four times the population of New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland.

“If we want something close to the size of Melbourne, the only option is Auckland, but it’s obviously quite expensive to be there,” Eva said.

“It’s probably similar to Melbourne, but in Melbourne you get better wages.

‘You just don’t get the same opportunities. There’s always something to do in Melbourne, there’s always events going on.’

After a 10-month stay in Europe, the couple plans to spend another two months in Southeast Asia before returning home, which is no longer in New Zealand.

“I don’t see us going back to New Zealand,” Eva said.

‘Payment is a big problem. If we could get the same pay, we might go back, but we’re still missing out on the city lifestyle.”

Eva said she and Tim had some regrets.

“We feel guilty for leaving, we miss our celebrations at home, so we feel guilty for missing that,” she said.

Eva said they wouldn’t have done thatleaving their country when they could have ‘taken care of us’.

“Australia has given us opportunities that we just wouldn’t have in New Zealand,” she said.

“People can call us unpatriotic, but we just have to do what’s best for us.”