Turns out the slowing economy in Australia isn’t just the concern of the financial sector. Young Australians are acutely aware that conditions aren’t exactly the most fruitful they’ve ever been, and are taking advantage of an increasingly borderless modern world for work opportunities overseas.
According to data gathered by recruitment firm Robert Walters, around 9 in 10 Millennials from Australia and New Zealand are harbouring the desire to chuck a move overseas and work.
And its largely due to the speculated economic downturn that the country is currently in the grips of, couple with long-standing issues to do with unemployment – particularly youth unemployment – and the physical and emotional difficulties associated with being a young person in the job market.
This trend is something of the inverse of the pre-Global Financial Crisis trend, which saw an influx of foreign workers seeking employment entering the country, as it weathered the GFC storm arguably better than any other developed nation.
Robert Walters ANZ managing director James Nicholson explained that Gen Y has grown up in a time where access to international travel is far greater, creating a much broader impression of an open global employment marketplace.
“Millennials, or Gen Y, have grown up in a borderless world with greater access to international travel, so their sights are set high to begin with.”
“With a lot of discussion around economic downturn locally, we are seeing a reverse trend from the post-GFC period when we were dealing with an influx of foreign workers looking for gainful employment.”
Meanwhile, despite this high desire from young people to advance their careers overseas, only 1 in 4 employers asked by the survey said they offered this to employees – a fact which Nicholson stated was “alarming.”
So with current financial conditions the way they are in the country, expect to bump into way more Australian bartenders as you pub-hop your way around Europe or the US in the coming years.
PRO TIP: Be rad to them, and tip them well. They’ll hook you up. Liquor licenses overseas are way keener on the free-pouring.
