Monetary and Multidimensional Poverty in Australia: A Dual Measurement Approach
Melek Cigdem‐Bayram,
Cara Nolan,
Ismo Rama and
Nicole Bieske
Australian Economic Review, 2025, vol. 58, issue S1, S72-S85
Abstract:
Australia's 2024 poverty rate is the highest it has been since 2001. Despite a lack of official poverty measures, recent data has shown that poverty affects 14.4% of the population including one in six children. These rates are higher than when Australia became a signatory of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) in 2015, steering it further off course from the goal of halving the proportion of the population living below the national poverty line by 2030. Without an agreed‐upon national definition and measures of poverty, it is also hard to meaningfully track progress. Marking the 50th anniversary of the Henderson Inquiry First Main Report, which first called for a national poverty measure, this paper revisits that call with new urgency. Drawing on Australia's current context and international examples, it proposes a dual approach to poverty measurement – monetary and multidimensional – and presents empirical findings from an illustrative model applying both. The paper examines the relationship between monetary and multidimensional poverty and the insights gained by measuring the two side‐by‐side that neither can yield in isolation. It concludes with recommendations for a legislated national poverty measure, informed by lessons from Canada and New Zealand, which implemented similar frameworks in recent years.
Date: 2025
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:
Downloads: (external link)
https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8462.70023
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bla:ausecr:v:58:y:2025:i:s1:p:s72-s85
Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://ordering.onl ... 7-8462&ref=1467-8462
Access Statistics for this article
Australian Economic Review is currently edited by John de New, Viet Hoang Nguyen and Susan Méndez
More articles in Australian Economic Review from The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Wiley Content Delivery ().