Sydney, Australia's largest city and New South Wales, this country's most populous state is losing citizens to other parts of the country - because we are no longer affordable to many !
This loss is reflected in housing. Last year NSW saw 2447 new homes built in contrast to 2914 in Victoria and 2978 in Queensland. The situation is even worse in comparison with Western Australia which built two and half times more homes than NSW last year.
When the Goods and Services Tax ( GST ) was implemented the states agreed to wind down certain taxes - predominantly land tax and stamp duty. They were given a few years relief before implementation - but when the time crunch came most reneged and claimed they could not afford to lose the revenue, despite receiving a huge supplement from the GST.
Now the smaller states are modifying their taxes and as a result those on low to average incomes are finding housing more affordable, shorter commuting time to work and less hassle in their lifestyles.
The end result is that Sydney in particular is being starved of workers who do the mundane things like driving taxis, collecting garbage and flipping burgers. We have priced them out of earning a living because of inflated house prices and rents and the general costs of living in a high tax state.
The price we will pay is higher wages for those who persevere and remain in this state to man those low wage jobs. This is becoming apparent with taxi drivers demanding increases in booking fees, use of the car boot for luggage and mileage because as congestion slows traffic on our roads their overall reward is lower because of time stalled in traffic.
Politicians are not good at keeping promises - but in this case it is a matter of survival. If we do not cut property taxes we will become one of the most expensive cities in the world - but with the lowest living standards when it comes to services.
Not even our beautiful harbour and sub-tropical climate could compensate for that !
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