A property market economist argues Australia needs a Medicare-like system to resolve its housing crisis. 

Home ownership in Australia has fallen to less than 70 per cent of the population and is expected to fall further.

Cameron Murray told Sofie Formica there’s a way to make housing more affordable that nobody’s tried.

“There’s two options to making housing cheaper: you can give people more money to buy homes or you can decrease the price.

“Notably, nobody’s decreased the price. No one has proposed a mass public housing provider to offer a cheap alternative.”

He compared the idea with Medicare, where healthcare was made more accessible by reducing the out-of-pocket cost.

“Did we give them a subsidy to take a loan so that they could get heart surgery or did we create a public system?”

“We are all, I think, very happy that we have a parallel public health system as well as a private health system.”

Dr Murray said a similar system has already proven to work overseas.

“We’ve had it in the past and we know it works because for example, countries like Singapore are standouts globally in tackling housing.

“They went from 20 per cent home ownership … to 90 per cent today.

“They did it because they have, essentially, Medicare for housing. Anyone who doesn’t own a home can buy a home at a discounted price from the public auction.”

Press PLAY below to hear the radical idea explained

Image: Getty