Working age Australians have become far less reliant on welfare payments, new figures show

Ben Schneiders

Senior writer for The Age

Working age Australians have become far less reliant on welfare payments since the turn of the century – undermining Abbott government claims of a crisis of welfare dependency in Australia.

The finding comes from the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey, an authoritative Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research report that has tracked more than 12,000 people since 2001.

The latest HILDA report, for 2011, shows rising inequality in Australia as well as flat or even falling living standards for middle-class Australians in the years after the global financial crisis.

But it also shows a marked trend away from working age Australians – and even pensioners – being as reliant on welfare.

Last month’s federal budget included a number of measures to restrict welfare, including preventing unemployed people under 30 getting access to payments for up to six months.

Treasurer Joe Hockey, in a speech last week, described Australia’s welfare system as ‘‘unsustainable’’ and said claims the budget was unfair were misguided “old-style socialism”.

He said the government was spending, on average, more than $6000 on welfare for every Australian.

“The average working Australian, be they a cleaner, a plumber or a teacher, is working over one month full-time each year just to pay for the welfare of another Australian,’’ he said.

Yet the HILDA research shows that in 2001 23 per cent of people aged 18 to 64 had received welfare payments each week and a decade later that had fallen sharply to 18.5 per cent.

There has also been a big drop in the percentage of working age households where more than 90 per cent of their income came from welfare. In 2001 that accounted for 7.1 per cent of households while a decade later it was just 4.8 per cent.

The proportion of retired people who relied on benefits as their main source of income also declined across the decade from 65.8 per cent to 63.5 per cent.

The report's author, Associate Professor Roger Wilkins, said Australia was experiencing its lowest level of welfare reliance in decades, possibly since the 1980s.

‘‘I’m absolutely bewildered by Hockey’s obsession on welfare reliance in Australia,’’ he said. ‘‘It’s lower than it's been in a couple of decades, possibly longer.’’

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Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/working-age-australians-have-become-far-less-reliant-on-welfare-payments-new-figures-show-20140615-zs8cv.html#ixzz34k5SbSdP