People are leaving New Zealand in record numbers as unemployment rises, interest rates remain high and economic growth is anaemic, government statistics show.

Data released by Statistics New Zealand on Tuesday showed that 131,200 people departed New Zealand in the year ended June 2024, provisionally the highest on record for an annual period. Around a third of these were headed to Australia.

While net migration, the number of those arriving minus those leaving, remains at high levels, economists also expect this to wane as the number of foreign nationals wanting to move to New Zealand falls due to the softer economy.

The data showed of those departing 80,174 were citizens, which was almost double the numbers seen leaving prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

  • auzy@lemmy.worldEnglish
    361·
    4 months ago

    Just to play devils advocate though… awesome people and awesome country.

    I’ve always wondered if I’d rather live there and be poor honestly than live here in Australia (which is basically at least 50% redneck at this point)

    • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldEnglish
      207·
      4 months ago

      It was so weird as an American to find out that country music is huge in Australia.

      It reminds me of how Mexican music was (and maybe still is) really popular in the Balkans because they were so closed off from most of the world when they were united as Yugoslavia.

        • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldEnglish
          245·
          4 months ago

          Because it’s a very American form of music. In fact, a lot of it involves a bunch of jingoistic patriotic bullshit.

          • GiveMemes@jlai.luEnglish
            8·
            4 months ago

            Some does. A lot does even, but not the best country music, not by a long shot.

            “Your flag decal won’t get you into heaven anymore”

            Edit:

            Figured I should share some tunes:

            Cruel world - Willie Nelson for rdr2

            Angel from Montgomery - John Prine, cover by Daniel Donato is also excellent

            Boombox, hogkill blues, 1922 blues - all by Charlie Parr, all excellent. Hogkill blues is abt a strike in which union workers were killed by counter-strikers.

            Prison Trilogy - Joan Baez - makes reference to the term wetback to refer to an immigrant (“his back was wet, but he thought he could get, some things to start a life”) but is otherwise an excellent song abt the fucked up American prison system

            Lots of love, hope you enjoy at least one of these!!

          • BestTestInTheWest@lemmy.worldEnglish
            8·
            4 months ago

            You should look into Australian country music, it’s different from American. American country music is still popular here but we’ve had a rich history of country music that is our own unique style.

            • Flying Squid@lemmy.worldEnglish
              91·
              4 months ago

              I get that. It just seemed to me, at least before I found that out, that it was a uniquely American form of music.

              Like imagine if you were from Mongolia, and someone was like, “throat-singing? We love that shit in Paraguay!” You’d probably think like I did about country music.

              • fine_sandy_bottom@lemmy.federate.ccEnglish
                61·
                4 months ago

                I guess so.

                I think you can safely assume that most American culture is imported into Australia, the good and the bad.

                Some ass-hats are trying to ban books about non-binary sexuality from our library. I had thought that was uniquely American.