Data for Australian work visa holders released

Australia, 15th April: Official figures concerning Australian work visa holders have been released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

According to the figures, presently, Australia has nearly 2.8 million foreigners working in Australia while the total work force employed in different jobs in Australia is 10.7 million. 

The fact that Australia’s skilled migration program is working successfully is established by the number of overseas immigrants in Australia employed as professionals in different fields in the country. 

Out of 2.8 million foreigners, nearly 26 percent happen to be immigrants working as professionals in Australia. As compared to 26 percent of immigrants working in a professional field, the percentage of Australian population employed as professionals is 20 percent. 

Talking about the number of unemployed in Australia including those having Australian work visas, the figures show that finding work in Australia is a problem not just for immigrants but even for Australians since the proportion of migrants as well as Australian nationals having worked previously is exactly the same. 

The data further adds that 67 percent of Australian nationals and migrants had been in some type of jobs in Australia in the period of last two years. 

A point worth mentioning here is that this data is until November 2008, and the data by ABS for 2009/2010 is likely to be entirely different because significant measures have been introduced by the Australian immigration department since November 2008 to allure highly skilled professionals to come to Australia and considerably reduced number of general skilled migrants into Australia. 

This means that the ABS figures will depict a higher number of highly skilled Australian work visa holders moving to work in Australia. 

Data for job beginners shows that nearly three-quarters of Australian born nationals are new job starters in the Australian job market and the most common job for Australian immigrants and migrants as new starters is working as a laborer. 

Figures by the ABS have clearly falsified a common perception of Australians that migrants in Australia take up a large number of jobs in Australia. The fact brought forth by the latest statistics is that workplace in Australia favors local workers rather than immigrants.