Originally Posted by
birch
There will never be any proof, but the basis of our differing opinions is, it seems where we read our news and gather our evidence. I've been living in Sydney for over 25 years - not that bears any relevance to the discussion. One example of a respected a-political economist is Saul Eastlake and I've found a research paper of his - copied below. There's many more similarly balanced, apolitical research papers if you should choose look for them. Simply listening to mainstream media or politicians won't always give you a very balance view on key issues that affect you. Using scapegoats may make you feel better but they won't help you cope better in an expensive, growing and generally propserous city.
Saul Eslake, economist at Merrill Lynch Australia, says Australians live in some of the world’s most expensive housing both in absolute terms and relative to incomes.
In a research note to clients, he outlines his take on why Australian housing is so relatively expensive:
World-wide, housing tends to be expensive in cities with populations of over 1 million, and a higher proportion of Australians live in such cities than anywhere else except Hong Kong and Singapore;
Because Australian cities cover very large areas but their outer suburbs are often poorly serviced by roads and public transport, Australians have increasingly chosen to spend a higher proportion of their incomes on housing so as to spend a smaller proportion of their time commuting;
Australians tend to live in larger houses or apartments than people in most other countries, something not captured in international comparisons;
Australians are now among the world’s highest income-earners on average and can thus afford to live in more expensive housing;
Unlike the US, Spain or Ireland, but like the UK, Australia has a long-standing physical shortage of housing, relative to the “underlying” demand for it; and
Australia’s tax system plays an unusual role in encouraging individual investment in residential real estate, which serves to inflate housing prices.