The post-study work rights Australia offers are too generous, offering false hope to many international graduates and adding to population pressures
That’s according to a Grattan Institute report released earlier this week.
Their findings are accurate, but their recommendations are misguided and not sufficiently informed by lived experience.
The reality is that international student employment outcomes are lower than their domestic student counterpart. With only half securing full-time employment and many in low-skilled jobs that do not match their qualifications, the contribution that international graduates make is far from meeting their potential.
You would be hard pressed to find any international graduate who disagree with these statistics. Despite paying upwards of $120,000 for a three-year degree in any major Australian university, international students are no strangers to rejection from recruiters across all sectors. Most never had a chance to hear these words from a human HR person at all – given that their CVs were thrown out if there is any mention of “temporary residency”.
Earlier this year, to combat the national skill shortage in the midst of record low unemployment rate, the Albanese government increased the duration of selected graduate visa schemes. The Grattan Institute slammed this policy as “moving in the wrong direction” and instead recommended shortening the visa duration. They also recommended raising the bar so that Australia can retain only the “exceptional talents”.
While the migration system is in need of significant reform, as noted in the Employment White Paper, raising the bar on post-study work visas will contradict the report’s own findings. Employers are reluctant to hire international graduates because of uncertainty over their future visa status – so how will reducing the visa duration address this problem?
By speaking with international graduates you quickly realise that there is little that this supply side of the labour market can do when the it is employers who are slaming the door on them. It’s an uphill battle, regardless of how good your English is, and no matter how talented you are.
What the government and the sector should look at are demand-side solutions.
It is well reported that a large proportion of employers are hesitant to hire graduates on a two-to-four-year temporary visas. This is despite 30-40 per cent of Australians aged between 20 and 29 have a job tenure of less than 12 months.
While employers are crying out for talent amidst the shortage, they should start by looking at their own hiring policies.
Many employers would do themselves a favour by removing barriers for qualified international graduates. If their problems are rooted in discrimination and bias, there is no amount of government incentives that can fix that.
What Grattan Institute and I can agree on with these findings is that universities should start pulling their weight. The biggest winners of the $40 billion pre-covid international education sector need to start thinking beyond their own income statement and about student employment outcomes. And they wonder why Australia’s reputation in international education is in limbo.
The views expressed in this piece are the author’s own, and do not reflect that of her employer.