Scoring the Wrong Things: Research Says Australia's Points Test Needs a Rethink, and Two Ways to Do It

News · 2026-09-03 · 6 min read

Most migration arguments in Australia come down to one question: too many people, or too few? It is a fight about volume. A far bigger question gets little attention. Among the migrants Australia already takes, is it choosing the people most likely to do well?

According to new research that follows tax, Census and visa records across three decades, the honest answer is no. The skilled migration points test, which decides who receives permanent residency, is quietly rewarding traits that do not matter much while underrating the ones that actually predict how much a migrant contributes to the economy over time.

For a tool that shapes the country's future workforce, tax base and skills mix, that is an expensive blind spot. And if you are a South African weighing up your own points, it is worth knowing which parts of the test may change.

The applicant has changed; the test has not

The points test was built decades ago for a typical applicant living offshore and applying from scratch. That is not how the system runs any more. Most points-tested visas now go to people already in Australia, and a large share of them are former international students moving from a study visa towards permanent residency.

At the same time, a big and growing group is stuck rolling from one bridging or temporary visa to the next, waiting. That is hard on the migrants themselves, and it adds pressure to housing, public services and infrastructure that were never planned for this kind of holding queue.

Most of the trouble starts with that mismatch between the test's original design and the way it is used today.

Points that predict little or nothing

Researchers matched tax results against visa pathways from the early 2010s up to 2022 and found something awkward for policymakers. A number of the criteria that currently earn points show little or no link to how well migrants do economically. Some are linked to poorer results.

The criteria in this group include:

community language credentials
study in a regional area
"professional year" programs
specialist qualifications outside the core regulated fields
having studied at an Australian university

The international student route looks especially weak. Migrants who came on a student visa and later moved through the points system usually earn less, and are much more likely to be working below their qualification level, than those who arrived another way.

Put simply, a pathway meant to reward local knowledge and integration may instead be a slow and costly detour for many applicants, and a drain on the system paying for it.

A design fault, not a dial to turn

It would be easy to call this a tuning job: adjust the point values and carry on. The real problem sits in the structure.

1. The weights are off. Age, education, English proficiency and relevant work experience have strong evidence behind them, yet they carry less weight than their predictive power deserves, while weak criteria still earn points.

2. One scale for very different job markets. The same points scale is used across completely different labour markets. It does a decent job in regulated professions such as healthcare, where a qualification lines up neatly with a job. It does badly in areas like engineering and business, where networks, local hiring habits and market fit count for more than a checklist.

3. Useful evidence goes unused. Migrants already working in Australia are scored on the same blind criteria as first-time offshore applicants, even though there are years of real, visible performance data on the first group. That signal is simply thrown away.

The reform choices researchers have put forward

The research offers more than one fix. Two serious options have come out of it, each balancing simplicity against impact in a different way.

Option 1: trim and reweight what is there. Remove the categories that predict nothing and move the weight onto the traits with solid evidence: age, education, English proficiency and Australian work experience. This is the easier option, a recalibration rather than a rebuild, and it would still improve results noticeably without redesigning the whole system.

Option 2: split the pathway into two streams. This is the bolder choice, with the larger possible payoff. Applicants would be divided by whether they are already working in the Australian labour market:

A skills-based stream for offshore applicants and recent graduates who are not yet working locally. It would be a classic points model weighted towards age, education and English, but limited to occupations where the evidence shows migrants without local experience really do find skilled work, mostly regulated fields such as medicine.
A labour-market-experience stream for temporary visa holders already employed in their nominated occupation. They would be judged mainly on age and their proven Australian earnings over the prior two years, rewarding people who have already shown what they can do locally.

The second stream in effect combines the logic of employer sponsorship with the flexibility of a points system, but ties it to something much more dependable than paper credentials: real, proven performance in Australia.

The knock-on effects

A better-tuned points test is more than office housekeeping. It would ripple across migration and education:

The permanent intake would tilt towards people more likely to find skilled work and pay more tax.
The pull towards visa chasing, where people pick courses to maximise points rather than for real career or learning value, would weaken.
Migrants and advisers would get much clearer direction: either build real strength in a regulated, in-demand occupation, or prove yourself in the Australian labour market. No more guessing which mix of extra credentials might tip the balance.

Australia's migration debate keeps coming back to volume: how many people, how fast to cut, how fast to grow. That misses the lever with the biggest long-term return, which is not how many migrants are accepted but how well they are selected. Getting it right depends less on politics and more on using data the country already holds, and it could be worth billions in productivity and tax revenue over time.

What this means for your planning

Nothing here is law yet, so plan on today's rules and keep watching official sources. Either way, the factors the research backs, such as age, education, English and real work experience, are the ones to strengthen. Get your IELTS or PTE score as high as you can, keep your qualifications and employment references in order, and focus on a solid, in-demand occupation rather than collecting extra credentials.

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