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The most popular spectator sport in Perth is Australian Rules football. Two teams in the Australian Football League (AFL) are based in Perth: the West Coast Eagles and the Fremantle Football Club (or "The Dockers").

Since the recession "Australia had to have" (P. Keating) in the early 1990s, the Australian economy has not suffered a recession or "trough" in the business cycle in 13 years. Even the downturn of the early 2000s did not affect its consistent GDP growth. As of October 2004, unemployment had fallen to a level of 5.2%, the lowest level since the late 1970s.

Many raw materials (including resources postulated to exist but yet to be discovered) remain mostly unexploited. Australia is often referred to by economists as the "world's farm", but despite this emphasis on the agriculture sector, in recent years the Australian government has been focusing on the tourism, education and technology markets.

The Australian aborigines , estimated to number as many as 350,000 at the time of the Europeans' arrival, was numbered at 386,049 (including Torres Strait Islanders, who are of Papuan descent) in 1996. Although still more rural than the general population, the aboriginal population has become more urbanized, with some two thirds living in cities. New South Wales and Queensland account for just over half of the Australian aboriginal population. In Tasmania the aboriginal population was virtually wiped out in the 19th century.

Melbourne has twice ranked first in a survey by The Economist of "The World's Most Livable Cities", once in 2002, and again in 2004. It is sometimes classed as a "world city"; one study group ranks Melbourne, on the basis of relative availability of specialised "advanced services" as a "minor world city" comparable to cities such as Vancouver, Osaka, and Prague.

The earliest music of Australia was the folk music of the Australian Aborigines. Aboriginal music declined after European colonisation, and has only recently begun to be revived, often with modernised influences. Bands like Yothu Yindi have begun the popularisation of Aboriginal folk in Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom and elsewhere. Australia has also been home to notable classical composers as well as artists working in popular music genres such as rock, jazz, country and electronic music.

Melbourne is the capital and largest city of the state of Victoria, and the second largest city in Australia, with a population of 52,117 in the Central Business District and 3,488,750 in the metropolitan area (census 2001).

English is the main official and spoken language in Australia, although some of the surviving Aboriginal communities maintain their native languages. A considerable number of first and sometimes second-generation migrants are bilingual; languages such as Italian, Cantonese and Greek are spoken in many communities.