We’re healthy, wealthy and wise

The 2011 census results were released last month and showed Southbank is full of educated young professionals, students, people who are more likely to be renting than own their home and people who earn more than the majority of Australia.

Amazingly, the individual wage for residents in Southbank is almost double that of the rest of Australia.

The average weekly income for Southbank residents was $983, dwarfing the national average of $577 per week. In addition, 18.8 per cent of households in Southbank had a combined income of over $3000 per week, compared with the national figure of 11.2 per cent.

Despite this higher income, Southbank dwellers are happier to rent their accommodation than the rest of the country. Some 58.4 per cent of residents are renting, compared with 29.6 per cent nation-wide.

Perhaps that can be attributed to the larger-than-usual population of 20-34 year-olds. Of Southbank’s 11,235 people, this group of young professionals and university students accounted for 57.7 per cent of the total Southbank population. Nationally only 20.6 per cent of people fall into this age bracket.

The push for better primary and secondary education services in the region appears to be backed up by the numbers, with over 1000 locals under the age of 19.

Our median age is 29, eight years younger than Australian median age.

This younger average age appears to explain the number of residents who have never married being 61.6 per cent, almost double the national figure of 34.3 per cent. We are also more multicultural than the rest of the country. Only 35 per cent of Southbank residents were born in Australia, almost half the national figure of 69.8 per cent.

After Australia, the most popular country of birth was China (8.1 per cent), then Indonesia (6.7 per cent), Malaysia (4.9 per cent), England (4 per cent) and New Zealand (3.6 per cent).

In addition, only half of our households exclusively speak English at home, compared with the national rate of 76.8 per cent. The most popular alternative language in Southbank is Mandarin (10.4 per cent). Other languages spoken in Southbank include Indonesian (6 per cent), Cantonese (4.6 per cent), Arabic (1.6 per cent) and Korean (1.6 per cent).

There’s good news in Southbank if you’re looking for Mr Right. While the rest of Australia is suffering a man-drought (there are 239,691 more females than males) Southbank bucks the national trend, having 422 more males.

It seems we are also becoming more secular, with 32.2 per cent of Southbank residents saying they had no religious affiliation, up from 23.6 per cent in the 2006 census. It is also higher than the national figure of 22.3 per cent. Catholicism is the most popular religion (18.6 per cent), followed by Buddhism (7.5 per cent), Anglican (6.8 per cent) an Hinduism (3.6 per cent).