Moving to Australia for work: what the pay comparison misses

Gross pay gap versus after-tax gap

The first step is to compare what you would actually receive in each country, not the headline salaries. Australia has its own income tax brackets, and most residents also pay the Medicare levy, which the Australian Taxation Office sets at 2% of taxable income. New Zealand has PAYE, the ACC earners' levy and, if you are a member, your KiwiSaver contribution.

Work out both on the same basis: the Australian Taxation Office publishes its current tax rates and calculators, and our article on working out take-home pay in New Zealand shows the New Zealand side. Convert at a realistic exchange rate, and remember it moves. Tax takes a different share on each side, so the after-tax gap can be wider or narrower than the gross one, and only the after-tax figures tell you which. A salary in Australian dollars is worth whatever the exchange rate says on the day you bring money home.

The Offer Comparer works out the New Zealand after-tax figure for an offer here, including employer KiwiSaver and other extras, with no account needed, which gives you a firm figure to set against the Australian one.

Superannuation, HECS and Medicare on the other side

Three Australian systems change the comparison:

• Superannuation. Australian employers must pay a superannuation guarantee of 12% of qualifying earnings, the rate since 1 July 2025. It goes into a retirement fund rather than your pocket, but it is a real part of the package and usually more than a New Zealand employer's KiwiSaver contribution. Check how an ad states pay: some salaries are quoted plus super and others as a package that includes it, which changes the base pay considerably.
• Medicare. As a New Zealand citizen you can enrol in Medicare if you can show you will live in Australia for six months or more, or have lived there for six months of the last twelve, or have applied for permanent residency.
• Student loans. HELP, formerly HECS, is Australia's system for its own students. What matters for most New Zealanders is their New Zealand student loan: it is interest-free only while you are based in New Zealand. Once you are overseas-based, which Inland Revenue broadly treats as being away for more than six months, interest is charged from the day after you left, at 5.6% for the 2027 tax year, and you must make minimum repayments set by your loan balance, due by 30 September and 31 March.

New Zealand citizens can live and work in Australia on a Special Category visa, granted on arrival, so the right to work is rarely the obstacle. The details of what each system gives you are.

Rent and cost of living by city

Where you live changes the comparison more than almost anything else. Rent in the centre of Sydney or Melbourne is very different from rent in Perth, Adelaide or a regional town, and the jobs that pay most are often in the dearest cities.

Before deciding, price the life you would actually have: rent for the kind of place you would live in, the commute from there to the job, groceries, power, insurance and transport. Current rental listings for the suburbs you would consider are the most reliable guide. Then compare that with your costs here, on the same after-tax basis as the pay.

The things that do not transfer

Some of what you have built in New Zealand does not come with you:

• KiwiSaver. A permanent move to Australia does not let you withdraw your KiwiSaver savings, as a move to most other countries can. If you move permanently, you can transfer them to an Australian super fund, but you do not have to. A transfer must be the whole balance, to a regulated fund rather than a self-managed one, and the New Zealand part can only be accessed at New Zealand's retirement age.
• Your network. Referees, contacts and a reputation in your field take years to rebuild. That has a real, if hard to price, value.
• Leave and service. Accrued service with a New Zealand employer does not carry over. Any annual holidays owed are paid out in your final pay, and you start again with the new employer.
• People. Family, friends and the support you rely on, which matters most when something goes wrong.

Deciding on numbers you have checked

Make the decision on figures you have worked out yourself, not on the headline salary in the ad or a friend's account of how much better it is. Put the after-tax pay in both countries side by side, add the superannuation, take off the higher living costs and the student loan interest, and then weigh what you would leave behind.

Our article on comparing two job offers sets out how to weigh the factors money does not capture. In jobtracker.co.nz, an Australian role and a New Zealand one can sit side by side with your notes on each. The take-home figures it works out use New Zealand tax, so for the Australian offer use the Australian Taxation Office's calculator and note the result against it.

Compare the move on checked numbers