A new research jointly conducted by University of New South Wales (UNSW) and the Australian Council of Social Services (ACOSS) has found that despite Australia’s economic growth in the past decade, poverty has not seen much change.
The 2020 Poverty in Australia Overview states that 13.6 per cent of Australia’s population (3.2 million) still lives in poverty.
This includes nearly 774,000 children under the age of 15 (17.7 per cent of the total population of that age group).
By Australian standards, an adult who earns less than $457 a week is considered to be below the poverty line.
Prof. Harminder Singh from Deakin University in Melbourne helps explains the report’s findings.
“It’s unfortunate that in a developed country like Australia, 3.2 million people are living below the poverty line. A major reason is expensive housing,” Prof. Singh says.
Explaining this further, he says that housing, be it owner-occupied or rented, is fast becoming unaffordable in Australia and eats up a major chunk of one’s income.
“This is a major talking point in economic policy-making circles and amongst researchers like myself,” says Prof. Singh, who is an associate professor of finance at Deakin University’s Department of Finance.
“The second reason behind poverty in Australia is inflation which is less when compared with other countries but hasn’t reduced here much. Another factor responsible for poverty in Australia is the slow pace of job creation in a country with rising population,” explains Prof. Singh.
He highlights that jobs are on the decline in Australia, whereas they should increase if the country’s economic health has to improve.
He also tries to juxtapose the poverty lines of Australia and India, cautioning that the contexts of both countries are so different that comparisons can’t be drawn between them.
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