Those who can’t afford, rent.

Those who can’t afford, rent.

by | 18 May, 2016 | Australia, demography, housing, politics, social issues

With so many budding photographers around Australia, it’s surprising the housing affordability conversation is so out of focus. It seems the pressure is on people paying hundreds a week into someone else’s investment, not on those depositing hundreds of thousands into their own investment bricks. While it may not impact the average Joe, nor Jane next door, rental (un)affordability seems to have a greater impact than the housing bubble on everyone’s lips.

One way to compare the pressures faced by renters and buyers is by analysing their decisions, or those they are forced into. This analysis, like a previous article,  focuses on small families (couples and single parents) with one or two children.  This is mostly to simplify comparisons, looking at a more homogeneous group, rather than drawing conclusions from a wider, more disparate cross-section of the community.

As previously shown, the majority of small families live in homes with a spare bedroom or two. However, a smaller section can’t afford enough bedrooms to go around. For some this means siblings sharing bedrooms, and for a smaller group the parents cohabitate with the kids.

Housing affordability might be affecting buyers and renters, but the figures below show that the pointy end of the rental market pricks more.

Based on 2011 Census data, couples with one child who rent are 8 times more likely to have to share rooms with their child than those who own or are buying their home. For single parents the ratio is 4 to 1. Likewise, families with 2 kids (couples and single parents) who rent are 5 times more likely to make their kids share a room than families who own or are buying.

Insufficient rooms

These families make up a very small proportion of the whole community. But this still affects over 5,400 single-child families living in homes with 1 bedroom or less (studio).

While I personally believe sibling make for great room-mates while growing up, modern Australian culture prefers otherwise, and the decision for kids sharing rooms is shaped somewhat by financial pressures. When parents share a bedroom with their kids, it’s even clearer that financial pressures forced them into an undesired situation.

Whether or not this issue’s media attention is disproportionate overall is a separate question, but perhaps we should pay less attention to those attempting to join the bourgeoisie, and more to the smaller groups facing eviction notices.

 

 

 

 

Affordability, it’s a matter of expectations

Affordability, it’s a matter of expectations

by | 15 May, 2016 | Australia, consumption, demography, housing, Inflation, politics, social issues

There is no doubt that Australian property prices are increasing at a rapid rate. Affordability, however, may depend on expectations.

There is a difference between something being unaffordable and it rapidly increasing in price. The topic of housing affordability has been on high rotation in Australian politics for the past few years.  It’s the pinnacle of two topics du jour: Capital Gains Tax and Negative gearing. Much has been written about the impact these two policies have had on house-prices since the 1980s.  However, most articles focus on the speed of the price increase, not on whether houses are relatively ‘affordable’?  What is affordable? Would we think houses affordable if prices dropped by a third?

Much was made of Turnbull’s interview with the one-year-old who negatively geared property (or at least her parents did), and how out of touch the sentiments of the interview were. But it is generally acceptable, on the other hand, for a couple with a 4-month-old to own a home with spare rooms¹.

“We don’t have unreasonable expectations, but those three-bedroom apartments and townhouses are cost prohibitive ….” said Ms Rule-Layton, Coburg.

Census figures show that when it comes to young families with one or two children, spare bedroom(s) are by far the norm, not the exception.

Of the 207,000 couples with one child owning (or paying off) a home in 2011, 91% had at least one spare room. Almost half of these had 2 spare bedrooms or more.

The situation is surprisingly similar for single parents with one kid.  More than 4 out of 5 had at least one spare bedroom, and 27% at least 2.

When it comes to 2 children families, the question of spare bedrooms is slightly more complicated as the issue of sharing bedrooms arises.  Statistics usually show you how many people and rooms there are per home, but not whether kids share rooms making others spare, etc.  However, only 3 in 100 home-owning couples with 2 kids had insufficient rooms for their kids not to have one each.  This figure only rises to 5 in 100 for single parents with 2 kids.

Couples kids rooms

According to the Real Estate Institute of Victoria, 3bdr apartments and houses in inner Melbourne are on average 54% and 32% more expensive than the 2bdr variety.  That roughly equates to an extra $310k for the 3rd bedroom of an apartment, and $285k in a house.

This ratio may not be representative of the whole country but it does suggest that the 3rd bedroom contributes substantially to the price of the dwelling (approximately 30% across the greater Melbourne).

Would homes be deemed affordable today, if the price dropped by this amount?

If families were willing to live without the luxury of a spare bedroom, this saving becomes a real possibility. This relates to the 9 out of 10 couples with one child, and 55 out of 100 couples with 2 children.  Also, to the 42 in 100 families with two kids who have individual rooms.

However, it seems Australians fear room sharing more than they do debt.

 

The extra bedroom phenomenon is not limited to Australia’s elite. The ratio of houses with at least one spare room is remarkably similar across all socio-economic backgrounds for couples and single-parent families with one child. The difference becomes noticeable on households with 2 or more spare bedrooms.

Couples rooms deciles

Single parentsrooms deciles

And while the spare bedroom, beyond individual kids’ rooms becomes more difficult for the less well-off families, only 9% of the poorest single-parent families don’t have enough rooms for their kids to sleep separately.

Single parentsrooms deciles 2 kids

There is no doubt that Australian property prices are increasing at a rapid rate. Affordability, however, may depend on expectations.

Australia’s housing standards are amongst the highest in the world. The OECD ranks Australia’s housing at 4t4h highest out of the 36 compared in the Better Life Index². Furthermore, within this champagne crowd Australia’s housing costs come a timid 11th cheapest (of the 36) in terms of housing costs vs disposable household income.

Not only are Australian housing standards particularly high, but they are also improving fast. The average floor-space of new homes increased by almost 40% since 1985³, to 208 metres2 in 2013. To put this in context, the average new home in Germany is 109m2 and in the UK it is 76m2.

Average space home

Based on the best international comparisons I could find4, Australia leads the way in size of new dwellings, easily doubling the size of many European countries’.

Apples w watermellons

So, when we hear international house price comparisons, it’s worth remembering we’re not always comparing apples with apples, but rather their apples with our watermelons.

Does Australia have a housing affordability crisis? It’s hard to say. It depends on your definition of affordable. However, there is a lot of room to move if we want to decrease the cost of housing without lowering our standards beyond what is considered acceptable across the rest of the world’s richest countries.

After all, do we even want our in-laws to have a spare room at our place to crash in?  Save yourself the $300k, and shout them a five-star hotel for the few nights a year they do visit the grandkids.

 

 

 

 

[1] http://www.domain.com.au/news/melbourne-apartment-boom-is-it-working-for-buyers-and-residents-20160429-gogjvs/

[2] http://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/topics/housing/

[3] http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Previousproducts/8752.0Feature%20Article1Jun%202013

[4] http://www.demographia.com/db-intlhouse.htm

How Aus $ affects Aus votes

How Aus $ affects Aus votes

by | 11 May, 2016 | Australia, data, education, income, politics, social issues

There is no correlation between an electorate’s socio-economic standing and its preferred political party, at least not in the 2013 elections.

The simplistic view of politics suggests one party proposes policies which help poor people and the other party angles to improve the lives of those more fortunate. Yet, in Australia, the socio-economic make-up of an electorate is a very poor predictor of which party will be voted in, at least not nation-wide. It seems Labor electorates are not the working class suburbs usually portrayed, and Liberal electorates aren’t the prime real estate so often generalised.

This is clearly seen when focusing on the top 10 Liberal/National coalition seats.

Top 10 Liberal Seats

As the graph above shows, the ‘rich’ are grossly under-represented in the top 3 ‘liberal/national’ seats, and in three more of the safest Liberal seats.  On the other hand, they are hugely overrepresented in the other 4 of the top 10 seats (averaging 85% of each overrepresented electorate).  As an example, Mallee, on the NSW/Victorian border, has the highest Liberal vote, yet over 50% of the population falls in the bottom 30%, and only 6% are considered in the top 30% of Australia.

The graph below examines the link across all the electorates, by mapping the Labor 2-party preferred vote to the percentage of the electorate which falls in the bottom 30% of the socio-economic spectrum. (It’s a mess!)

Link Labour SEIFA

Similarly, there appears to be no relationship between party allegiance and private schooling.  For all the apparent willingness of the Liberal party to support private schools, areas with a high percentage of kids attending private school are just as likely to vote blue as they are red.

Liberal Private schools

While it seems there is no link between ‘class’ and politics Australia wide, a relationship does exist within capital cities.  Filtering out electorates which have less than two-thirds of its population within a capital city (using ABS’s remoteness divisions), a correlation of 0.51 appears between the Labor vote and areas with high proportions of low socio-economic households.  This means that the larger the percentage of ‘lower class’ households in an electorate, the more likely Labor is to win the seat.  Similarly, the more rich households there are in a city electorate, the more likely the Liberal Party is to win.

(Graph slightly less messy.)

Link in Cities

No such link appears to occur outside of the major cities, neither in regional cities nor in rural areas.

So, are parties not catering to one side over the other, or are constituents unable to discern how each party’s policies will affect them, or do people not vote based on what may benefit them? Or is politics a whole lot more complicated than that?

 

 

______________________________

 

Sources

Voting from Australian Electorate Commission http://results.aec.gov.au/17496/Website/HouseDownloadsMenu-17496-csv.htm

Socio-economic and School attendance from ABS, Census Statistics.

http://www.abs.gov.au/websitedbs/censushome.nsf/home/Census?opendocument&ref=topBar

Smoking the poor

Smoking the poor

by | 4 May, 2016 | Australia, consumption, demography, health, Inflation, social issues, tax

Australia’s 2016-17 budget announcement included “four annual 12.5 per cent increases in tobacco excise and excise equivalent customs duties”, claiming it will raise “$4.7bn over the next four years”.¹

This is unlikely to face much opposition. After all, taxing smoking aims to discourage the leading cause of preventable deaths in Australia².

But it’s interesting to see who will be most impacted by this, as smoking is a poor person’s game.

Based on 2009-10 household expenditure data³, increasing the cost of smoking will have a much larger impact on the poorest sectors of the community than anyone else.  More specifically, it will impact households receiving unemployment, disability, and carers payments – those already under the most amount of financial strain.

Smoking poor

Back in 2010, the poorest 20% of households were already spending four times as much of their weekly expenditure as the richest 20%.  Households whose main source of income was unemployment benefits spent three and half times the national average on tobacco, in relation to their total income.  Those whose main income was disability and carer payments spent three times the national average.

This is likely to be much more accentuated today as the 25% annual increase in tobacco excise since 2010 has almost doubled the price of cigarettes since that data was produced[4].

So how will this picture look in 4 years’ time, after 8 years of tobacco increases, when a packet of winnie blues cost $50?

Smoking is addictive. I suspect it’s easier to sell a house than quit smoking. Yet, when governments change legislation, making previous decisions less financially desirable, there’s usually talk of ‘grandfathering’ policies. That is to say that if we ever change capital gains policies we’ll ensure those who got in on the action prior to the changes don’t lose out.  Should similar considerations be made with smokers? Or is this more like the drug dealer who gives away the first few hits until you’re hooked, and then jacks up the prices, marginalising the destitute to a life of crime, imprisonment and social isolation?

I suspect it’s not all bad. Many will quit, thus improving their lives, and those of their loved ones. But for those unable to let go of nicotine’s vice, I suspect health issues will be only part of their worries.

 

 

[1] http://www.budget.gov.au/2016-17/content/glossies/tax_super/html/tax_super-05.htm#health

[2] http://www.quit.org.au/resource-centre/facts-evidence/the-big-kill

[3] http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Lookup/6530.0Main+Features12009-10?OpenDocument

[4] http://www.tobaccoinaustralia.org.au/13-3-the-price-of-tobacco-products-in-australia

Funding a safety net for private education

Funding a safety net for private education

by | 28 Apr, 2016 | education, public funding, social issues

Private education allows parents to segregate their offspring based on various socio-economic boundaries.  It limits kids’ socialisation across the wider community, and diminishes awareness of how others live. I don’t believe private schools help create a better society, and it should cease to be a legitimate option.

However, while parents are allowed to send their kids to private schools, it is the government’s responsibility to ensure these are adequately funded to provide a standard level of education.

I usually sit on the anti-paternalistic side of the fence, but I also don’t believe children should suffer due to their parents’ bad decisions. So, much like enforcing vaccination, I think the Government should support private schools to provide decent education.

It may surprise many to know that Australian private schools have less money per student than Government schools ($15,500¹ vs $16,177 in 2012-13²).

While funding for Government schools is relatively evenly spread³, private school funding ranges widely depending on the school and its community.
When picturing private schools, many imagine the top echelons of elitism.  Pompously dressed kids hopscotching their way to Scotch College, Xavier or Sydney/Geelong/Brisbane Grammar.  These do possess much higher budgets than public schools, and should potentially lose all subsidies.  But for every Scotch kid sipping their single-origin soy-latte for morning-tea there are numerous Penola Catholic College and St Bishoy Coptic Orthodox College students boiling their International Roast.  These less famous private schools make up the majority of the private student population.

In 2012-134, the average private contribution to non-government schools was $6,574 per student.  Unfortunately, the MySchool website does not facilitate broad research as not all information is easily available in one dataset5 (figures have to be searched one school at a time), so studies on this is difficult.  However, by cherry picking some obvious cases, private contributions (fees, charges, parental contributions and other private sources)  range from $1.5k to $37.3k (Our Lady of the Sacred Heart Thamarrurr Catholic College NT and Sydney Grammar School being the examples). Seeing as the average is just under $7k, there must be way more schools like Thamarrurr’s than Grammar schools (in funding terms). Without government funding, the majority of private schools would have less than half the $ per student that state schools have.

School funding by decile

While the likelihood of attending a private school increases with socio-economic standing, 22% of students from the lowest socio-economic decile attended a private school based on 2011 Census data.  And over a third of “middle class” students (deciles 4 to 7) attended these schools too6.

While attending private schooling is a choice, it’s usually (I assume, don’t have the figures here) a choice made by the parents, not the kids. Kids whose parents make bad decisions probably already suffer enough through other means. At least their schools should be adequately funded.

Private school fees can be exorbitant, but most people aren’t aware of the amounts spent on public education, so the fees we hear about are hard to contextualise or compare.

In 2013-14 Australian Governments provided $16,177 per student to public schools.  This funding was also topped up by parental contributions and other private sources. While fees and extra funding in public schools may not be as much as private school fees on average, they can amount to considerable figures.  One example found by searching in wealthy areas is that of Auburn State High School, in the Western Suburbs of Melbourne7, which accumulated over $4,000 per student from private sources.

{As an aside, the examples above show how public schools in wealthy areas (e.g. Auburn) have greater private funding (on top of greater government funding) than some private schools (e.g. Thamarrurr in the NT).} 

By sending their kids to private schools, parents default on ‘full government assistance’. Government contributions to private schools bring the average funding up to almost public school levels.  The current federal government funding model for private schools takes into account the socio-economic situation of the students’ families. Schools with high socio-economic students receive as little as 30% of a “full government funded student”, and schools with low socio-economic student receive as much as 70%.  It could be argued that the current funding model is not targeted enough.  Rich schools should receive 0%, and poor ones closer to 100%.

Having said all that, this is trying to deal with a sub-optimal situation.  Better still would be to remove the possibility of kids attending such establishments, and ensuring all students get the education they need, without segregation by religion, social standing, or any other way in which you want to cut society.

 

[1] Derived from https://www.aisnsw.edu.au/Publications/Other/Documents/ISCA%20Snapshot%202015.pdf & http://www.ncec.catholic.edu.au/resources/publications/353-2013-annual-report/file

[2] Latest comparisons freely available.

[3] Funding for schools differs according to the needs of the students attending, but the range is a lot smaller than private school funding.

[4] Latest freely available.

[5] Despite Federal Government having a policy of “open data by default”.

[6] This analysis uses the SEIFA Index of Relative Socio-economic Advantage and Disadvantage (IRSAD).

[6] This might be the topic for another post.

Death Tree

Death Tree

by | 2 Apr, 2016 | demography, gender, health, mortality

Not quite as cool as the Death Star, this Death Tree breaks down the 153,580 deaths which occurred in Australia in 2014, by cause:

Interpreting the Tree
Size of the box shows relative number of deaths, compared to all other deaths.
The colour represents the sex divide.
The bluer boxes represent diseases which kill more men than women. The yellow boxes kill more women than men. The legend on the top right provides a guide as to the sex representation.

Navigating the Death Tree
Left clicking drills down into finer level causes (e.g.: Cancer breaks down into Lung cancer, colon cancer, breast cancer, etc.).
Right clicking drills back up.

All causes are classified using the International Classification of Diseases (ICD).

The Death Tree provides a bigger, more user-friendly representation.

In the meantime, here is a smaller embedded version:

Everyday people, everyday deaths

Everyday people, everyday deaths

by | 31 Mar, 2016 | demography, health, mortality

You may not have read it in the newspapers this morning, nor on social media, but 421 Australians died yesterday. And the day before. And most likely today too. Roughly speaking of course, averaging out the 153,580 who died over the course of 2014¹. (Coincidentally, 153,000 is roughly how many people die worldwide per day².)

The media may focus on the half a person murdered per day, or the 3.8 people tragically killed on the roads, but to use a common idiom, the majority of people who died in 2014 (55%) ‘had a good innings’. (A good innings, in my eyes, equates to living past 80.) But this has not long been the case. Until 2005 less than half of Australians who died each year reached 80. In fact, the percentage of people who died before reaching 80 was 44% in 2000, 34% in 1990, and 29% in 1980³.

The graph below shows the percentage of deaths by age group, since 1910.Age of death 1910-2013

The gains achieved over the past 115 years are huge. Much of the improvement, in particular in the first half of the century, was a result of decreased infant (under 1) and child (1 to 4 years) mortality. Infant deaths decreased from 81 deaths per 1,000 live births in 1910 to 25 per 1,000 in 1950, to just 3 in 2014 [4].

The improvements over the last 50 years, however, have also been driven by decreased rates of death in older Australians. This, in no small part, is a result of the improved ways in which we deal with heart disease. Heart disease is “the largest single cause of death in Australia” [5], but if current trends continue it won’t be for long. While heart disease (ICD-10 I20–I25) accounted for 30% of all deaths in 1970, by 2014 this had decreased to 13%.

Over the past 18 years heart attacks (which account for about half of all heart disease deaths) have dropped from 13% of all deaths to 6%. Dementia on the other hand, has increased from 1% to 5%. The changes have been so pronounced that dementia now kills more women than heart attacks do.

Heart attcks vs dementia

Since 1997, the number of heart disease deaths has reduced by an average of 505 people per year. That’s twice the average number of murder victims per year (which itself is decreasing).

Society is not getting more violent, or more dangerous. But improvements in the way we treat health conditions have dramatically improved and extended our lives.

If the amount of attention on scientific and medical improvements, as well as sensationalised but unlikely scenarios, more accurately reflected reality, perhaps we would have a very different perception of our state of affairs.

Shit’s getting better. Way better.

_

To better understand what people die of these days, the Death Tree Map linked here shows all Deaths in Australia in 2014 by cause. Clicking each category drills into finer categories in greater detail (i.e. Cancer breaks down into Lung cancer, colon cancer, breast cancer, etc.). Right clicking drills up.
The colour represents the sex divide. The bluer boxes represent diseases which kill men more than women. The yellow boxes kill more women than men. The legend on the top right guides the sex representation.
(below is a smaller representation of the Death Tree Map)

 

[1]http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs310/en/index2.html[2]http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Lookup/3302.0Main+Features12014?OpenDocument[3]http://www.aihw.gov.au/deaths/grim-books/[4]http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/0/C6A9CBD96E6BA43DCA257943000CEDF5?opendocument[5] http://www.aihw.gov.au/WorkArea/DownloadAsset.aspx?id=60129547044

 

If Australia were 100 stereotypes

If Australia were 100 stereotypes

by | 25 Mar, 2016 | gender, income, occupation, social issues, tax

For as long as I can remember it’s felt like we’ve been breaking down barriers and tearing down the regimes of acceptability. Traditional roles are no longer the norm, travelled by choice not momentum. Everybody’s road-fork a choice to be made.
But despite the changes, work occupations are still bastions of gender segregation.

Clichés and stereotypes such as tradies are men and teachers are women may not help fight outdated and ingrained social expectations, but they’re still the case in Australia, according to the latest ATO figures for 2013-14. Based on self-identified information from tax returns, there are 52,305 carpenters in Australia, of which only 127 are women. Similarly, only 94 of the 34,362 plumbers are women. That’s 0.2% and 0.3% of each occupation.

To simplify the situation using a popular meme: if Australia were 100 carpenters (or plumbers), none of them would be women. Not one.

IfAuswere 100 Carpenters

(I’ve not stats on how many are called Warren)

While I expected clichés to imitate life, I assumed they were exaggerating.

Overall, 637,402 Australians work in occupations where men make up at least 99% of the workforce. That’s 6% of all people with a known occupation. More broadly speaking, 35% of tax-paying men have roles where men make up at least 90% of the occupation. 50% occupy roles where men dominate by at least 80%. That’s to say that half of all working men live in roles where they outnumber women by (at least) 4 to 1. This includes occupations such as:

Top men occupations

What kind of impact is this environment and constant reinforcement having on half of all men?

While women dominated roles are less pronounced, 40% of women work in roles where women make up (at least) 80% of the workforce. This includes the following occupations:

Top women occupations

This lopsidedness on both sides means a minority of all workers (17%) fill roles which are equally distributed. (Evenly distributed is defined as 50 +/- 10%.)

Distribution of sex occupations

If we are to break down the gap between sexes, either roles need to become a lot less “gendered” or occupations need to become a lot more evenly rewarded. Whilst some movements has been made towards more equal distributions in the past 30 years, the information above shows there’s a huge way still to go.

 

All figures based on ATO statistics for 2013-14, Individuals Table 14A&14B.

https://www.ato.gov.au/About-ATO/Research-and-statistics/In-detail/Tax-statistics/Taxation-statistics-2013-14/

 

 

De-constructing the ‘g’ gap

De-constructing the ‘g’ gap

by | 15 Mar, 2016 | Australia, data, demography, gender, income, occupation, social issues

Last week was International Women’s Day so everyone should be up to date with the latest estimate of the gender pay gap (17%), and very well versed on at least three theories behind it.

Now, then, might be the perfect time to ask why the social progress and workforce changes which occurred over the last 30 years have had no impact on the gap.

The increasing awareness, numerous policies, university attendance explosion, increasing maternity leave and participation rates, industrial and occupational distributions, and a myriad other variables have increased or decreased to varying degrees. Mostly towards gender parity. Yet the pay gap for full-time women has not deviated more than +/- 2 percentage points since Lionel Ritchie first sang “Hello…. is it me you’re looking for?!”[1].

Gender Pay gap 83 15

The gap itself is a complex issue with many moving parts. This is a look at a few of those parts, and a general wondering: how is it not improving?

 

An aging workforce

One of the biggest changes in the workforce has been workers’ age. Average full-time wages increase rapidly with age, until they begin plateauing around 30, finally peaking in the late 30s to mid 40s (depending on occupation and role).  On average, workers under 25 earn 40% less than those 25 years and over[2].

Historically, one of the reasons behind the wage gap has been that working women are dis-proportionally younger than men, and therefore lower paid (i.e. junior staff on junior wages).  But the age demographic across the sexes has become a lot more equal over the last few decades.

While the overall percentage of workers under 25 has halved since 1983, women’s compositional distribution has changed much more than men’s (as shown by the graph below)[3].

Aging workforce by Sex

This suggests junior wages, or wages from young staff who are yet to reach role maturity, should have a much smaller impact on the overall average wage than it used to. Thus, diminishing one reason why there may be a pay-gap.

On the other end of the maturity spectrum, the proportion of women over 40 has almost doubled since 1983.  This suggests a greater proportion of women are returning to full-time employment after giving birth, continuing to build on their careers, with advanced wages.

Aging workforce by catergories

The changes in women’s labour force have been so substantial that the average age gap between the sexes is less than a quarter of what it used to be: down from 4.5 years in 1983 to 1 year gap in 2015.

This said, women have not achieved age parity in the workforce, but it’s certainly a lot closer than it used to be. Yet, the pay-gap has not changed since ‘Return of the Jedi‘ hit the cinema screens.

 

Women learning it for themselves

One potential reason behind the maturing female workforce is the increasing number of women attending university.  University attendance has increased across the board, but women’s increase has doubled men’s.  While women had not achieved tertiary education parity by the early 80s, they well and truly have by 2015.  In 2013, 58% of all Australians studying at university are women. This is just as true for postgrads as it is for undergrads. In fact, women have been the majority at uni since 1987[4].

This increase in university attendance has flowed to the labour force.  Full-time working women are now 45% more likely to have graduated from university than their male counterparts.

Uni Attainment in LF by sex

However, not all graduates are created equal. Some fields of study pay more than others, and the figures above don’t provide that level of detail. But overall graduates earn substantially more than workers with no university qualifications, and women are increasingly dominating this sphere.

This further suggests a move towards pay parity.  Yet, the pay-gap has not changed since Bob Hawke first became Prime Minister of Australia.

 

From doing to managing – occupational changes

Higher paid occupations (e.g. managers and professionals) now make up much larger proportions of the workforce than they did in the mid80s. Whether it’s due to social progress, the growing number of university educated women, or any other reason, the proportion of women in these roles has increased faster than men’s over the period in question.  The proportions of full-time women in the two highest paid occupations, professional and managerial roles, have increased 12 and 6 percentage points respectively. Men, on the other hand, increased 7 and 2 percentage points.

To balance this out, the proportions of women filling admin, labouring and sales roles (the three lowest paid occupations) have decreased by 11, 4 and 3 percentage points, to men’s 2, 4 and 1.

The graph below compares the proportion of women and men by occupation in 2015 to 1986. Higher paid occupations have generally increased, and low paid decreased… and women have faired better at both ends of the spectrum.

 

Occupation can still account for some of the current disparity. Despite the move towards higher paid roles, women are still over represented in some of the lower paid occupations; e.g. 25% of women fill admin roles, as opposed to 7% of men. But the changes over the past 30 years should have had an impact on the pay disparity.

Yet, the pay gap has not changed since the average price for a Melbourne house was $52,000[5].

Changing occupations by sex2

Mining the AGEING boom

Unlike the other variables examined, women have not clearly moved to the higher paid industries over the past 30 years. In fact, women have slightly decreased proportional representation for the three highest paid industries when compared to men (i.e. mining, financial and professional services). Mining is of particular interest as it is the highest income by almost $40k, and the boom meant its growth outstripped every other industry’s growth. These two aspects combine to help stretch the pay-gap further apart.

Changes in Industry distribution, by sex, 1984 to 2015

Changing industry by sex 3

The industry experiencing the largest increase in women participation has been Health Care and Social Assistance, potentially on the back of Australia’s ageing population’s demand. While its income is only marginally below the average for all industries, the increase in Health and Social assistants means women have not migrated towards the higher paid industries in large numbers.

Having said that, as previously described, women have gained much ground in GP representation.  The proportion of women GPs has increased from 22% in 1984 to 43% in 2014*.  This means that whilst women continue to be over represented in lower paid industries, they are filling higher paid roles within these industries.

 

Ask for more

Data on workforce by “method of setting pay” (i.e. opportunity to negotiate pay, which some suggest promotes disparity) has been hard to come by. This aspect may be extended upon in future.

 

Yet, not.

Most of these changes suggest the gender pay gap should have decreased over the past 30 years. At the very least it shows the variability of many contributing aspects. To not have achieved pay parity is understandable, as there are still many obstacles to overcome, and underlying contexts/assumptions/social norms to change. And many tricky issues to figure out on how to get there.

  • Should more women work in higher paid industries, or should we (financially) value women-dominated industries more?
  • Are health and education paid less because they are women heavy industries, or are they women-dominated because they are lower paid?
  • Should we increase paternity leave to support women to stay, or support them to return after birth-giving?
  • Should women be encouraged to negotiate more or should industrial frameworks diminish the impact negotiation has on individual’s pay?

But to not have made any improvement, despite all the changes that have occurred seems odd. Changes in age  alone should have had massive impacts.

Yet, not. No change, improvement or otherwise.

This post has no answers or suggestions… just a baffled look to greater minds to tells us why…

 

 

 

[1] Based on Full-time ordinary wages, by sex from Average Wages, ABS: http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6302.0Nov%202015?OpenDocument

[2] http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6306.0May%202014?OpenDocument

[3] http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6291.0.55.003Nov%202015?OpenDocument

[4] http://docs.education.gov.au/system/files/doc/other/time_series_data_1949_-_2000.pdf and http://highereducationstatistics.education.gov.au/

[5] http://www.econ.mq.edu.au/Econ_docs/research_papers2/2004_research_papers/Abelson_9_04.pdf

 

Australia’s war on what

Australia’s war on what

by | 7 Feb, 2016 | Australia, demography, Indigenous, prison, social issues

The incarceration rate in the U.S. is ridiculous, but it wasn’t always like this.

The 1970s kicked-off the ‘tough on crime’ and ‘war on drugs’ period, which has had such an impact that the U.S. now has the highest prisoner rate in the world (discounting Seychelles), and currently stands at over 4 times the OECD average¹. In fact, the U.S.’s willingness to imprison its people is so out of step with the rest of the world that it now hosts almost a quarter of the entire world’s prisoners².

Yet, the incarceration rate of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people is more than twice³ the rate of the U.S. … and growing!

The first graph has been doing the rounds for the last couple of years, and shows how the U.S.’s willingness to imprison its population has changed over the last few decades.

The second graph compares the American rate to that of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in Australia.

How bad is the crime situation in Australia that has lead to this?

 

 

 

[1] http://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/factbook-2010-en/11/04/01/index.html?contentType=%2Fns%2FStatisticalPublication%2C%2Fns%2FChapter&itemId=%2Fcontent%2Fchapter%2Ffactbook-2010-95-en&mimeType=text%2Fhtml&containerItemId=%2Fcontent%2Fchapter%2Ffactbook-2010-95-en&accessItemIds=&_csp_=4f5272543a5f9d2bef941b4101f970ae

[2]  Roy Walmsley (November 21, 2013). World Prison Population List (tenth edition). International Centre for Prison Studies.

[3] Comparisons across international jurisdictions are more complicated.  Generally the ABS figures for rate of imprisonment is based on all people in jail per 100,000 adults. The US figures in the historical data presented here, however, only include ‘prisoners sentenced for 1 year or more’. The graph provided shows comparable data, based on the same variables. The relevant Australian figures for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people are derived using data in Table 10 of ABS’s Prison publication linked below.

U.S. Data for 1925 to1977 from http://www.albany.edu/sourcebook/pdf/section6.pdf

U.S. Data 1978 to 2014 from http://www.bjs.gov/ –  Corrections Statistical Analysis Tool (CSAT) – Prisoners

Australia Data: http://abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/allprimarymainfeatures/8D5807D8074A7A5BCA256A6800811054?opendocument

Prisoner publication 2005 to 2015 – please request derived figures. Planning to have datasets available online in future.

 

4:  Picture used with CC authority, thanks to: www.flickr.com/photos/marineperez/4698707308

Picture changed to highlight that 1 in 3 people in Australia’s jails are Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander.

Tassie’s brain haemorrhage

Tassie’s brain haemorrhage

by | 23 Jan, 2016 | Australia, demography, education

For many, university represent freedom – intellectually, socially and economically. Tertiary education can stretch our horizons, taking us to places beyond. For Tasmanians, it seems, University often takes you off the island.

This is beyond a brain drain.
In 2013, 14% of all Australian university applications were for an interstate or international university. Tasmanians, however, appeared decisively keener to move, with 43% of their applications being for universities beyond their borders.

Tassie Interstate Uni Applications 1

Tasmanians were also more likely to go through with their intentions. While interstate offers are only accepted 40% of time (Australia wide), Tasmanians’ acceptance rate of 62% is by far the highest of all states.

Tassie Interstate Uni Offers1

The end result: 24% of Tasmanians heading off to university start by boarding a boat (or plane). In comparison, 7% of non-Tasmanians leave their state to attend university.

Tassie Interstate Uni moves 1

Maybe it’s time for the University of Tasmania to revamp their advertising campaign.

 

Alternative music drowns out the call for change

Alternative music drowns out the call for change

by | 16 Jan, 2016 | Australia, demography, Indigenous

Like many of my generation, I have fabulous memories of Australia Day from my teenage and Uni years.  In fact, I used to claim Australia Day to be my favourite public holiday.

This is in no small part for two reasons:

Since the early 90s, Triple J has been galvanising Australia Day’s place in contemporary culture, providing the youth with strong bonds and fond memories. In fact, Triple J has helped Australia Day seem like the most inclusive day of all: the day in which all it takes to have access to the country’s best musical festival is a radio; and a mobile to have a say.

The day plays perfectly to all Australian clichés: sun, beer, music, mates, and backyard BBQs.

All while turning a blind eye to what the day represents.

For over 20 years, Triple J has been doing the community a disservice. Perhaps unwittingly so, but these positive connotations of the 26th January are distancing an increasingly large section of the community (over 2 million in 2014¹) from recognising the terrible past it represents, and the symbolic weight it still holds for many today.

The devastation of Australia’s Indigenous peoples, which begun with the arrival of the British colonisers on the 26th January 1788, was so severe that roughly 10 times more Indigenous people died by Australian Federation than all Australian casualties in WWI².

Triple J is a wonderful radio station which supports youth and independent music across the community. They support initiatives such as mentoring and unearthing Indigenous artists, as well as the National Indigenous Music Awards. This year the Hottest 100 is also partnering with AIME to “help close the education gap between Indigenous and non-Indigenous Australian students”³.

So, this all begs the question: why do they continue to host their biggest day of the year on a day which commemorates the beginning of a massacre, dispossession, and centuries of legislated racial discrimination which almost destroyed the ‘oldest living cultural history in the world’4?

While it might be difficult to move Australia Day for now, it may help if we stop drowning out the calls for change with the coolest karaoke party ever.

Does the Hottest 100 even need to be on a public holiday?  Is the Hottest 100 Day not enough of a celebration?

Sure, it’d be great to still have it when it’s hot… so how about the third Saturday of January? It even ensures you get an extra day to recover before going back to work!

Let 2016 be the last Triple J Hottest 100 held on the 26th January.

Let 2017’s Hottest 100 be a day we can all celebrate!

#letsmovehottest100day #hottest100

 

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triple_J_Hottest_100

[2] https://www.awm.gov.au/atwar/ww1/ & https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Indigenous_Australians

[3] http://www.abc.net.au/triplej/hottest100/15/donate/

[4] http://www.australia.gov.au/about-australia/australian-story/austn-indigenous-cultural-heritage