The Australian Bureau of Statistics’ latest breakdown of Australia’s population shows that the stereotypes hold true.
Baby boomers are about to retire in the coastal towns and the inner city is still the favourite haunt of the young and unattached.
The figures for 2014 of Australia’s population show that of the 23.49 million Australians, half are under the age of 37 years. Slightly more citizens are female at 50.3% and two thirds of all Aussies choose to live live in the country’s major metropolises .
If you live in South Australians, and in Tasmania specifically, chances are you are on average much older than your fellow Australians with 36.3% of South Australians and 38.7% of Tasmanian’s over the age of 50 compared to 32.8% of the nation
Queensland is the youngest state, with just 31.9% of its residents above 50 years of age. But the only 22.6% of the population in the Northern Territory and 28.6% in ACT are aged 50 years and older.
Age really does seem to affect where Aussies live with three quarters of Australians aged between 25 and 29 calling big cities home and just over half of senior citizens doing the same. According to the stats the areas which have the highest concentration of people over the age of 70 are places like Tuncurry on the NSW mid-north coast with a 30.2% population of silver foxes – well above the national average of 9.9%.
The ABS notes that “the majority (63%) of baby boomers lived in Australia’s capital cities in 2014” they too will be found in greater concentration “located around larger urban centres in regional Australia or along the coast”.
Young families are perdictabilly found in the suburbs, like Wakerly in Brisbane’s, Parklea in Sydney’s outer suburbs and Forde in the ACT north have both high concentration of Generation X residents – those aged in the mid 30s to late 40s – and also a high concentration of children under 14.
Gen Y (which the ABS counts as including those born up to 1986) on the other hand – and that even younger group generally referred to as the “millennial”, are not to be found in high concentration in the outer suburbs, but in the inner city.
The data also shows us where there are highest imbalances of men and women. Obviously, men aged 20 to 65 are in the mining areas. In East Pilbara, for example, there are 413 men for every 100 women – compared to the national average of 99.6 men per 100 women. While ACT is also home to the area with the highest concentration of women. The suburbs of Hackett, Cook and Stirling in particular have more women. In Hackett, there are just 75 men for every 100 women. Interestingly in 82% of such families, the parent is a woman – reflecting on the social situation in the area.