Australia's future population will be older, with a greater proportion of people living in capital cities, according to new modelling.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics has released new population projection figures for 2012 to 2101. Under a medium growth-rate scenario, Australia's population would be 53.5 million by 2101. Under the high and low scenarios it would be 70 million and 42.3 million respectively.
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Each of the three scenarios uses different figures to determine the population, based on differing values for total fertility rate, mortality, and migration. You can read more about the methods here.
One of the biggest changes for Australia is the ageing of the population. Due to increasing life expectancy, the median age is projected to rise to between 43.1 and 46.2 by 2101 – this is up from the current 37.3.
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This means the proportion of older people in the population is increasing and the proportion of younger decreasing. Of particular interest is the decline in 15–65 year olds, which contains everyone of working age, and has some obvious implications for the workforce as a whole. Here's how the change will look under the medium growth (series B) scenario:
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Capital cities are projected to increase their share of state population over the next 50 years, with the proportion of the population in almost all the capitals increasing under the medium growth scenario. Darwin was the exception, with the proportion of population in the NT capital decreasing, and Canberra wasn't separated from the ACT in the projections.
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At the moment 66% of Australians live in capital cities. By 2061 this is projected to increase to 73%.
The Sydney and Melbourne rivalry is alive and well, with Melbourne projected to overtake Sydney for Australia's most populous city under the high (series A) and medium (series B) growth scenarios. Sydney however retains the crown under the low growth scenario (series C):
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