The Politics of Poverty in Australia

Poverty persists in Australia despite the existence of a welfare system. The paper describes the ways in which poverty is measured in Australia and notes the trend away from reliance on poverty lines based on single measures of income to more comprehensive multi-dimensional measures of deprivation. We describe the groups most likely to live in poverty as women, single parents, Indigenous Australians and the unemployed. We note the significant overlap between these groups. We examine public policy responses to poverty and note that public discourse has largely moved from using the concept of poverty to using that of social exclusion. The main Australian policy responses are welfare payments and support for public housing. We note that welfare payments to the unemployed have become progressively less generous and more conditional in the past two decades. The introduction of conditionality in welfare is supported by both major parties. The prospects for reducing poverty are considered and the principle mechanism is presented as redistributive policies through progressive taxation regimes. The paper concludes with a consideration of advocacy for poverty reduction.