Tax breaks for returnees? Sir John Key calls for bold ideas to stem brain drain | Stuff.co.nz

Ajouté : 2026-05-13

[00:00:00]Sir John Key says bold incentives are needed to stem the brain drain.

[00:00:05]Countries such as Ireland and Poland offer tax breaks to retain local talent, while Portugal allows its workers to pay no tax in their first decade on the job.

[00:00:16]While not going that far, our former Prime Minister says New Zealand needs to make staying worthwhile.

[00:00:23]Here is Rebecca Wright.

[00:00:26]Our migration woes are going global.

[00:00:28]Coming up, the brain drain away from New Zealand. What's causing it, and can anything be done? Bloomberg Small Street Week taking a deep dive into the exodus to Australia. Once you get paid, it would just be rent, groceries, gas, all the money's gone, essentially. I basically doubled my income in less than a year. And featuring our former Prime Minister. There's just no question that those jobs and opportunities are bigger, and the lifestyle is very similar. In the year to September, on average, around 112 Kiwis left for Australia every day. A total of around 41,500.

[00:01:05]Many of them between 18 and 35. Sir John Key told Bloomberg an uneven recovery in the economy is part of the issue.

[00:01:14]Auckland and Wellington, the main centers have been weaker, and largely weaker because of negative house prices and the sort of negative wealth effect of people living in Auckland. It has quite a big impact. And there's no doubt the tight job market is also playing a part. Unemployment in Auckland is at 6.3% and youth unemployment in the Auckland region has 18.7% of 15 to 24s out of work. We're a little bit like Canada as to the United States, and the and the United States is a is a is a sort of magnet for talent out of Canada. Pay packets are higher, opportunities are greater. It's a little bit like that from New Zealand to Australia. So, we asked the current Prime Minister for his view. Tens of thousands of New Zealanders move to Australia every year. Should we be doing more to keep them here? Many of them, as you know, go to Australia. Many of them coming back from Australia and other parts of the world. 600,000 are in Australia at the moment.

[00:02:09]>> They were There's been always a lot large diaspora in Australia, but isn't it fantastic? Isn't it great? And we should be celebrating the fact that we've had an 18% growth in Kiwis coming home. The fact remains that many more New Zealanders are leaving to Australia than are coming home. And Key says we need to think about incentives to stem the flow. As politicians and I think even as business leaders, we feel unclean about any kind of incentive to do something, but Ireland's done that.

[00:02:36]It's been quite prepared to do that. I mean, Israel probably has incentives all over the show. I'm guessing in the technology space. I'm just saying I just wonder whether we we we sort of we let perfection get in the way of the possible. Ireland and Israel both provide company and employee tax breaks to attract and retain talent.

[00:02:55]Poland provides tax exemptions for those under 26, and Portugal offers exemptions for workers for the first decade of employment. Any thoughts on that? Well, that's not something we've considered at this point in time. Our job Our job is Our job fundamentally is to build an economy where people feel they can work hard and get ahead. Down in Parliament, the idea of providing tax breaks to retain Kiwi talent received mixed reviews. Do you think that there needs to be incentives to keep people in New Zealand? Stop brain drain? I mean, one of the easiest incentives would be to lower the cost of living and ensure that people's basic needs are being met.

[00:03:28]>> Well, what one incentive we already have is that if you come home and you've got a student loan, you don't pay any interest. What we've seen is an exodus of a lot of our young people, particularly in the brain drain, off to Australia. We would support anything that encourages that one our whanau are able to stay home if that's their choice. The latest migration figures are out tomorrow.