International students deserve concession Opal cards

Ben Hines opines.

The impact of the Coronavirus Pandemic on lives around the country, and indeed the world, is obvious; the word “unprecedented” having been repeated ad nauseum and the ability for the phrase “new normal” to elicit a physical cringe is evidence enough. One demographic impacted particularly strongly is international students, both those stuck in Australia away from their families and those stuck overseas away from their educational institutions. The nexus of a rebooting economy and the hope that international travel may slowly return once a vaccine is successfully rolled out provides a compelling impetus to return to the consideration of concession Opal cards for international students.

A simple concession card alone will not solve the many ongoing issues faced by international students, yet with New South Wales being the only state which excludes international university students from public transport concessions, it is a start. When considering extending concession Opal cards to international students, the most obvious benefits are intuitive. To not do so is at best unfair and at worst actively discriminatory. Both of these claims are compelling. Both are also not new, and Pulp has not given me enough words to go into either. 

What the discussion really needs is to be reframed, in terms of the concessions themselves and those who receive them, at which point most arguments against extending this concession fall by the wayside.

Concession cards are not welfare

It is important to consider why concession cards exist for regular students in the first place. One usual line of argument put against extending the Opal concession to international students is grounded in the idea that such a concession is itself a form of welfare, or a taxpayer funded discount to students. The conclusion that international students and their parents, being citizens or residents of another country, do not pay taxes, is then used to make the claim that they are not entitled to the fruits of Australian tax dollars.  However, this argument falls down in a number of areas.

First, whilst it may be true that international students do not pay taxes in the same way domestic citizens would, such as income tax, they do in fact still contribute in other ways, such as paying consumption tax in the form of GST. In fact, according to the Mitchell Institute, approximately 57% of the income associated with international students arises from money spent on goods and services in the wider economy, all of which are firstly subject to a buyer-side tax on international students, but secondly are subject to a seller-side tax on the part of the business. Whether directly or indirectly, international students substantially increase Australia’s tax revenue.  

Second, the entire characterisation of the concession as a form of “welfare” is itself flawed. The purpose of a concession card is not only to save students’ money, but to act as an incentive. This is because to an extent it enables students to focus on their studies without worrying about having to work ridiculous hours to afford transport to their educational institutions. In doing so, as mentioned, it reduces some of the economic barriers to study and even incentivises potential students to enrol. Critically however, these concessions exist for all students, regardless of their income status. Students with affluent parents whose credit cards are linked to their Opal cards are not subject to a means test and are able to claim the same concession as those who would genuinely be unable to travel without one. Students who need to take two trains, three buses, and walk ten minutes do not get their concession at the exclusion of the student who catches a single bus for six minutes to their university’s front gate. 

The benefits underpinning this incentive to Australia are clearly not exclusively the result of domestic students taking it up, and even if such an incentive is insufficient to solve the fact that applications for international student study visas were down 80-90% last year, the removal of the idea that a concession card is a government handout for taxpaying citizens means that the nature of the concession itself as an intrinsic reason to withhold it is undermined.

Higher study fees do not justify imposing higher transport fees

The fact that international students pay such high fees is often used as a justification for their ability to afford full fare prices. Conversely however, this also exists as a compelling reason to extend concessions to these students. The fact they are already spending such high figures to be educated in Australia renders it unfair to withhold benefits afforded to other students. Additionally, the higher fees paid by international students represents an incredible contribution to the Australian economy that far outweighs the “cost” of extending the concession. Just because such students are paying more in one area does not make it a good idea to make them do so in another. 

The counter-argument on the “high fees” point relies on the idea that international students are universally so affluent as a result of their higher fees, an idea that fails to consider the realities of the international student experience. Claims surrounding the financial capability of international students in any realm needs to be framed in the knowledge that the cost of their degree is firstly yes, much higher than domestic students and often paid up front, but secondly and more pertinently likely paid for by their parents. With that in mind, it is also important to dispel the harmful stereotype of all international students as able to spend their parents’ money at will on anything they like, accompanied by the idea of designer clothes and expensive accessories. This is clearly not all international students. Many international students’ parents are, in an incredibly generous act, willing to pay for their education. However, there is a large sector of international students who, once they are in the country, need to work tirelessly to afford their own expenses, including rent, food, and transport. They do not have the luxury of living at home with all expenses paid like many domestic students, nor do all have their parents’ income to subsidise their commutes. To say that international students can afford the higher price with reference to their degree cost is making a ridiculous generalisation.

In fact, noting that international students are arguably more likely to suffer exploitative workplace environments and lower pay, not only are they not universally “able to afford it”, but actually may be economically disadvantaged. Even if this were not the case, the argument that their higher financial means should translate to higher cost of transport is only applied to   international students. This argument’s disregard for wealthy domestic students - who, are not means-tested for their concessions - is inherently unfair.

Overall, using ideas of international student affluence as justifying withholding concession cards is not only ridiculously flawed, but also inaccurately applied universally to many international students to whom it is simply not accurate.

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Arguments against international student concession cards are therefore the result of suboptimal and inaccurate characterisations of concession cards and international students. In a post-COVID economy that is already struggling to bring in international students exists the opportunity to correct this social imbalance. The Government should extend concession Opal cards to international students.