I don't personally see many of the signs of the "housing crisis" where I live except in the value of my PPOR which keeps increasing. Although a young couple who just bought the house over the road are working multiple jobs to pay for it but the old retired couple who sold it to them for more than i thought it was worth were very happy with their windfall.
Anyway there are two main lots of migration figures. The regulated permanent migrant program which the Government sets targets for. Those numbers are quite reasonable IMHO.
The other is net migration which includes people who are here on a temporary basis along with returning expats minus those of similar categories who leave. Australia doesn't cap those numbers of entry visas that have associated work rights. It's the work rights that make Australia a desirable destination.
I see Canada is facing similar problems to Australia and has decided to see if they can introduce soft caps to reduce the number of temporary entrants to their country. Their attempts include charging business a higher fee to sponsor foreign workers in an attempt to get them to invest time and money into training locals. As far as I can see all that Australia has done so far is crack down on dodgy International student training courses passed off as education.
OTTAWA - For the first time, Canada will put a "soft cap" on the number of new temporary resident arrivals to the country when it sets immigration levels in the fall, Immigration Minister Marc Miller announced Thursday. The announcement is the latest in a series of steps Miller has taken in recent months to rein in rampant population growth. The federal government plans to decrease the number of temporary residents to five per cent of the population over the next three years, down from the current 6.2 per cent The first targets will be set in September.
