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https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2025/feb/12/share-of-wealth-held-by-australias-poorest-falls-by-almost-30-since-2004-report>
"The share of wealth held by Australia’s bottom 40% has declined sharply in the
last two decades while 3.3 million live below the poverty line, a damning
report into Australia’s track record on quality of life has revealed.
Monash University’s third
Transforming Australia report, released on
Thursday, shows progress on more than half of the 80 indicators has stalled or
is in freefall, painting a deteriorating picture of the country’s social,
economic and environmental wellbeing.
Without a change of course, including a focus on long-term policymaking beyond
the three-year federal election cycle, Australia will continue to lag behind
the developed world, the report warns.
The report, which uses long-term data sources to analyse Australia’s
development over the years, found inequalities across wealth, housing, health
and education were worsening.
More than 3 million Australians, or 12.7%, lived below the poverty line,
according to 2020 data, putting Australia above the OECD average of 12.1% and
peer countries, such as Canada (8.6%) and the UK (11.2%).
Australia’s ratings worsened in both wealth and income inequality. The share of
the country’s wealth held by the bottom 40% of society declined from 7.8% in
2004 to about 5.5% in 2020.
The report’s analysis showed almost 24% of Australia’s wealth was held by the
top 1% of income-earners, while the top 10% had 57% of the country’s wealth.
Australia fared better than the US, where 34.9% of its wealth was held by the
top 1% and 70.7% by the top 10%."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
