More and more Australians are seeing the brighter side of the ditch and moving over to settle in New Zealand.
Figures shown in the annual Australian Department of Immigration and Citizenship's publication - Emigration 2008-2009 - show that the steady stream of Australians moving to New Zealand has been increasing since 1998.
This year's (2008-09) figures show that a total of 14,352 Australians made the big move.
Last year the number stood at 14,160, whereas in the period of 1998-99, the number of people moving from Australia was 7468.
The figures show that in the past decade, the number of Australians choosing to cross the Tasman has doubled and New Zealand remains one of the main countries those leaving Australia are choosing to go to.
This year's report, released late last week, showed the number of Australians who permanently left the country was the highest to date.
Just over 81,000 Australian residents permanently left the country during the year - an increase of about 5.3% from last year (2007-08).
Most of them, the report said, were young and skilled workers.
Business New Zealand chief executive Phil O'Reilly said many people coming to New Zealand were chasing a particular opportunity no longer available in Australia.
Others, he said, were actually New Zealanders who moved across the ditch to work and were returning home.
"Infrastructure and mining opportunities over there have been slow and if you've got a trade or better, it's much more likely that you'll get a job here, even during a recession," he said.
The many young people choosing to come to New Zealand to find new jobs was, however, a temporary trend, Mr O'Reilly said.
The challenge New Zealand employers now faced was to get people to stay and to get them to think of it as a career, as opposed to a job.
"You're more likely to leave your job if you don't like it. [But] if you have job prospectives, promotional opportunities and you like the community and people, you're more likely to stay," Mr O'Reilly said.
Statistics New Zealand figures show that in the year ending in October, the net permanent and long-term migration to Australia was 21,200.
That figure was 34,600 in October 2008 and it has been decreasing since December 2008, when up to 35,600 people left to live in Australia.
