My Blog

Tag: Economics

  • Centre For Future Work to evolve into standalone entity

    The Centre for Future Work was established by the Australia Institute in 2016 to conduct and publish progressive economic research on work, employment, and labour markets.

    Supported by the Australian Union movement, the centre produced cutting edge research and led the national conversation on economic issues facing working people: including the future of jobs, wages and income distribution, skills and training, sector and industry policies, globalisation, the role of government, public services, and more.

    The Centre will now evolve to a stand-alone centre sitting outside of the Australia Institute.

    “The Australia Institute and the Centre for Future Work have been such an important and powerful partnership in advocating for and winning ideas that make the world of work better. We look forward to what this next chapter can bring,” said Michele O’Neil, President of the Australian Council of Trade Unions.

    “We are thrilled to have been able to seed this important initiative and build it to where it is able to stand alone. The Australia Institute will continue to work with the Centre for Future Work to amplify good policy solutions for workplace issues,” said Leanne Minshull, co-CEO of The Australia Institute.

    The post Centre For Future Work to evolve into standalone entity appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Australia dumps its care crisis on the Pacific

    A report by the Centre for Future Work at The Australia Institute and Public Services International has also found that when workers get to Australia, many are being deskilled, underpaid and exploited.

    Care workers have been added to the Pacific Australia Labor Mobility (PALM) scheme, traditionally aimed at seasonal agriculture workers like fruit pickers. This has led to skilled health workers – like nurses – quitting their jobs to take up better paid but lower skilled jobs in Australia.

    The report details the harrowing state of the health systems in Fiji, Papua New Guinea, Samoa, the Solomon Islands and Vanuatu. Many health services and hospitals have been decimated, operating at 30-40 percent capacity or below.

    The research reveals that not only are Pacific workers doing lower-skilled care jobs in Australia, they are vulnerable to poor treatment, due to their visa status.

    “Workers have the right to cross borders for a better life for themselves and their families,” said Fiona Macdonald, Director of the Centre for Future Work at The Australia Institute.

    “But the current system is broken. It is rich countries taking from poor countries and giving nothing back. Australia and New Zealand are offloading their own care crises to their Pacific neighbours.

    “Australia has vowed to invest in the health systems of its Pacific neighbours, not destroy them. It should be helping to build better, safer health facilities and train workers, not lure them away.

    “We are taking workers out of a system already at breaking point, giving them jobs which are below their skill level and failing to protect them from exploitation and mistreatment.

    “The recruiting and labour hire systems, including international schemes like PALM, need urgent reform. This should start with meaningful dialogue with the workers themselves.”

    The post Australia dumps its care crisis on the Pacific – new report appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Addressing the health workforce crisis in the Pacific

    Labour mobility is a significant contributor to Pacific Islands’ economies.

    Australia and New Zealand’s temporary labour migration schemes for Pacific workers have expanded into more industries including personal care work in aged care.

    This has led to the loss of skilled health workers from Pacific Island countries, including registered nurses, to lower-skilled personal care jobs overseas.

    Workers who take up temporary migration in Australia and New Zealand are vulnerable to being underpaid and exploited, due to their visa status.

    This report examines the need for reform of labour migration systems and greater consultation with workers.

    The post Addressing the health workforce crisis in the Pacific appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Go Home On Time Day 2025

    The research has been released today to mark Go Home On Time Day 2025, an initiative by the Centre for Future Work, now into its 17th year.

    It is the first full year since Right To Disconnect Laws were introduced in Australia, back in August 2024.

    As full time employees and their bosses come to grips with workers’ right to switch off, the burden is shifting to part time and casual employees.

    Overall, Australians are still doing more than three and a half hours of unpaid overtime each week – the equivalent to four and a half full-time weeks per year.

    The average workers is losing nearly $8000 a year, which is ripping a staggering $95.8 billion a year out of the pockets of Australian workers.

    Key points:

    • Full-time employees average 3.8 hours of unpaid overtime a week. For every ten hours of paid work, they’re working one for nothing.
    • Despite doing significantly fewer hours overall, part-time employees do 3.7 hours of unpaid overtime a week. For every seven hours of paid work, they’re doing nearly an hour for nothing.
    • Younger people (18-24) do the most unpaid overtime at 4.7 hours a week, equivalent to almost one hour of unpaid work for every five paid hours.
    • Unpaid overtime equates to almost 173 hours per year, per worker, more than 4.5 full-time weeks.
    • If that unpaid overtime was valued at median wage rates, the average worker is losing $7,930 a year or $305 a fortnight.
      • Economy-wide, that equates to almost $95.8 billion of lost income a year, which is more than the government spends on the NDIS and Aged Care combined.

    “Australians have been giving their bosses so many free hours for so many years, we were never going to see the level of unpaid overtime suddenly plummet,” said Fiona Macdonald, Director of the Centre for Future Work at The Australia Institute.

    “The situation for full time workers has stabilised. It’s a good first step. I would say, for them, the right to disconnect is working.

    “But this is the first time we have seen rates of unpaid overtime for part time workers almost as high as full time workers.

    “The right to disconnect is less effective for part time workers and casuals because they are simply not given enough paid hours to do their jobs.

    “Young people who are already on the lowest incomes are bearing the brunt of this trend towards squeezing part timers.

    “However you look at it, Australian workers are being ripped off. The cost of living crisis isn’t over. Now, more than ever, workers should be paid for every single hour they work. ”

    The post Go Home On Time Day 2025. As full timers disconnect, part timers are doing more unpaid overtime appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Too much work and too few paid hours? (GHOTD 2025)

    Widespread dissatisfaction with paid work hours, and employees working excessive unpaid overtime, are two of the key findings of the 2025 Go Home on Time Day (GHOTD) survey. The annual survey, undertaken by the Centre for Future Work at the Australia Institute in early September, asked 1,001 Australian workers about their paid working hours and preferences and about any unpaid overtime they worked.

    The findings of the 2025 survey, marking the seventeenth Go Home on Time Day, are not dissimilar to the 2024 survey findings. A large minority of Australian workers would prefer either more or fewer paid work hours. Mostly, workers who are dissatisfied with their hours want more paid work hours (44% of all workers), while a smaller group (14%) want less paid work time. Alongside the desire for more work many employees are working several hours of unpaid overtime each week. This is the case for employees of all ages and for men and women across most industries and occupations. The 2025 GHOTD survey found, on average, employees work unpaid overtime of 3.6 hours a week, equivalent to 173 hours, or over 4.5 weeks, a year. Paid at the median wage rate this amounts to a financial cost to each worker of $7,930 per year; in total a loss of $95.78 billion.

    A positive finding from the 2025 survey is that unpaid overtime among full-time employees appears to be continuing a slow decline, noted in 2024. This suggests the “Right to Disconnect” legislation, introduced for employees in large organisations in August 2024, may be having its intended impact. The legislation was only extended to small businesses in August 2025, so we might expect to see further declines in unpaid overtime in 2026. A less positive finding is that unpaid overtime is high among part-time and casual employees, many of whom are younger workers. The costs of unpaid overtime to these workers are substantial–especially when considered as a proportion of their paid work time, given their shorter paid work hours and often lower pay rates.

    Read the full report

    The post Too much work and too few paid hours? appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Too much work and too few paid hours — survey results

    Widespread dissatisfaction with paid work hours, and employees working excessive unpaid overtime, are two of the key findings of the 2025 Go Home on Time Day (GHOTD) survey. The annual survey, undertaken by the Centre for Future Work at the Australia Institute in early September, asked 1,001 Australian workers about their paid working hours and preferences and about any unpaid overtime they worked.

    The findings of the 2025 survey, marking the seventeenth Go Home on Time Day, are not dissimilar to the 2024 survey findings. A large minority of Australian workers would prefer either more or fewer paid work hours. Mostly, workers who are dissatisfied with their hours want more paid work hours (44% of all workers), while a smaller group (14%) want less paid work time. Alongside the desire for more work many employees are working several hours of unpaid overtime each week. This is the case for employees of all ages and for men and women across most industries and occupations. The 2025 GHOTD survey found, on average, employees work unpaid overtime of 3.6 hours a week, equivalent to 173 hours, or over 4.5 weeks, a year. Paid at the median wage rate this amounts to a financial cost to each worker of $7,930 per year; in total a loss of $95.78 billion.

    A positive finding from the 2025 survey is that unpaid overtime among full-time employees appears to be continuing a slow decline, noted in 2024. This suggests the “Right to Disconnect” legislation, introduced for employees in large organisations in August 2024, may be having its intended impact. The legislation was only extended to small businesses in August 2025, so we might expect to see further declines in unpaid overtime in 2026. A less positive finding is that unpaid overtime is high among part-time and casual employees, many of whom are younger workers. The costs of unpaid overtime to these workers are substantial–especially when considered as a proportion of their paid work time, given their shorter paid work hours and often lower pay rates.

    Read the full report

    The post Too much work and too few paid hours? appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Australian Sovereignty and the Path to Peace – Carmichael Lecture 2025

    This year’s lecture was delivered by the Hon Doug Cameron, former NSW Senator, on September 10 in the Solidarity Hall at the Victorian Trades Hall Council.

    The Laurie Carmichael Lecture is an annual keynote lecture hosted by the Carmichael Centre, an initiative of the Australia Institute’s Centre for Future Work, in partnership with RMIT University’s Business and Human Rights Centre (BHRIGHT). It is supported by the ACTU, the AMWU, the AEU, and The Australia Institute.

    The post Australian Sovereignty and the Path to Peace – 2025 Laurie Carmichael Lecture appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Solving the crisis: Raising the living standards of Australian workers

    Productivity might be the word on everyone’s lips in the lead up to the Albanese Government’s Economic Reform Roundtable however weak productivity isn’t the cause of many of the problems experience by workers in Australia today nor is increasing productivity the solution. Rapid inflation after the pandemic, combined with rising interest rates and slow wage growth, left many Australian households struggling to afford necessities. The Reserve Bank’s (RBA) blunt strategy of raising interest rates to slow the economy post the pandemic both misdiagnosed the drivers of inflation and harmed Australian workers who struggled to manage increased mortgage repayments and other debts. The root causes of Australia’s post pandemic crisis—rising corporate profits, unjustifiable price hikes, and deep wage stagnation were ignored by the RBA.

    Despite a reduction in inflation and interest rates, too many Australians are still experiencing lower living standards after the turbulent events of the past five years. Official inflation figures may capture broad economic trends however, they do not adequately describe the real pressures experienced by working people—particularly when it comes to the impact of the increasing costs of essentials like food, housing, and energy. Australian workers can ill afford another round of RBA driven unemployment, austerity, and uncertainty.

    What will it take to repair the damage to Australian workers’ living standards?

    In a new publication, Solving the Crisis: Raising the Living standards of Australian workers, some of Australia’s leading progressive economists and social policy analysts explain what is going on and how to fix it. The origins of the current crisis in living standards are documented. A progressive policy agenda for a second term Albanese Government is advanced.

    The multidimensional policy agenda in Solving the Crisis calls for

    • increases in real wages
    • achieving full employment
    • better quality jobs and greater assistance and respect for those seeking employment
    • strengthening public services (including health care, childcare, aged care and education)
    • making fair and affordable housing available
    • developing a well-planned and supported transition to renewable energy sources.

    The key to the success of this agenda is centering the experience of workers’ and their families.

    Australia should adopt a progressive multidimensional economic agenda that lifts living standards, reduces inequality, and strengthens democracy, rather than a narrow concentration on productivity. Uniting people behind this progressive economic agenda helps counter the trend towards increasing inequality, division and conflict, that has been present in other countries.

    How to solve the living standards crisis

    Four policy papers are the core of Solving the Crisis. These papers examine the main drivers of inequality and deteriorating living standards in Australia

    • Greg Jericho examines how inflation is misunderstood when disconnected from wage growth. He proposes a shift in Reserve Bank policy and a renewed focus on promoting real wage increases.
    • Peter Davidson argues that growing inequality is not inevitable. Through strengthening the four key policy pillars – income support, minimum wages, full employment, and employment services – minimum incomes can be raised and inequality reduced.
    • Thomas Greenwell highlights how decades of declining collective bargaining and high underemployment have undermined living standards. He calls for renewed support for unions, stronger collective bargaining systems, and a focus on full employment in macroeconomic policy.
    • Charlie Joyce revisits the concept of the social wage—and argues that rebuilding and expanding the social wage can raise living standards, promote inclusion, and restore trust in democratic institutions.

    Together these papers provide practical policy solutions forming a platform for economic reform.

    Solving the Crisis helps working people to help cut through economic misinformation and political spin, offering a clear lens on the structural factors that have driven inequality and declining living standards.

    Progress is happening

    In its first term the Albanese Government has made cautious progress on living standards. This progress includes labour market reforms that have contributed to stronger wage growth. These reforms include supporting increases in the minimum wage, facilitating collective bargaining in hard-to-organise industries, funding support for wage increase in early childhood education and aged care. Cost-of-living measures, like energy rebates and expanded renter assistance, also provide important support to hard-hit households. Meanwhile, the easing of interest rates by the RBA—better late than never, may support future growth and job-creation.

    However, while prices are growing more slowly, the levels of many prices remain too high—especially for necessities like food, housing, and energy. Wages growth may have commenced however at the current pace, it will take several years to repair real wages, and restore the same purchasing power for workers they enjoyed before the pandemic. The quality of public services (another critical determinant of living standards) has been damaged by underfunding and overreliance on privatised provision, the costs of which we are currently seeing in early childhood education and care. Minimum income payments such as Jobseeker remain woefully inadequate. The system designed to support and assist people from unemployment into decent jobs is broken beyond repair. Meanwhile, global economic and geopolitical uncertainty threatens to derail this modest recovery before it really gets going.

    More work to be done

    At the 2025 federal election the Australian people rejected political parties proposing cuts to public services, short-term fixes (like petrol tax cuts), and the politics of division. In its second term the Albanese Government has a unique opportunity to implement progressive policy changes such as those contained in Solving the Crisis.

    More details about Solving the Crisis and additional resources are available at https://www.carmichaelcentre.org.au/living_standards.

    The post Solving the crisis: Raising the living standards of Australian workers appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Australia does not have a productivity crisis

    Like the rest of the world, productivity has been sluggish since the COVID pandemic, but that is largely due to businesses failing to adequately invest in machinery, equipment, technology and skills, at a time when many are recording record profits.

    The research also reveals that disappointing productivity is not the cause of the problems facing Australian households, like falling real wages, high prices, high interest rates and the unaffordability of housing.

    Key findings:

    • If real wages had grown at the same rate of productivity since 2000, average wages would be 18% – or $350 per week – higher.
    • Australian businesses now invest less than half as much in research and development as those in other OECD countries.
    • Higher productivity does not automatically “trickle down” to workers in terms of improved wages or living standards.
    • Productivity benefits are trending toward high-paid executives, shareholders and profits, rather than workers.
    • Business claims that productivity can be improved by wage cuts, tax cuts, deregulation or reduced unionisation are false.
    • The idea that workers should “tighten their belts and make do with less” to improve productivity is a lie.

    “Productivity has become an excuse for big, profitable businesses to do whatever they like,” said Greg Jericho, Chief Economist at The Australia Institute‘s Centre for Future Work.

    “Peter Dutton said he’d tear up the new right-to-disconnect laws, saying they hampered productivity, as if allowing employers to call staff any time of the day or night would somehow make them more efficient. This research dispels that kind of nonsense.

    “Australia’s so-called ‘productivity crisis’ is massively exaggerated. Low productivity is not to blame for the problems facing households today, like soaring interest rates, prices or low wage growth.

    “This research also shows that sluggish productivity is caused by companies investing far less in things like machinery, equipment and research.

    “The benefits of productivity should not go straight to profits, shareholders or fat cat CEOs. They should be shared with workers in the form of wages which grow at a similar rate.

    “That way productivity would deliver its true purpose: to provide economic prosperity and a higher quality of life for everyone.”

    The post Australia does not have a “productivity crisis” – new research appeared first on The Australia Institute's Centre for Future Work.

  • Productivity in the Real World

    Claims that Australia faces a productivity crisis are overblown. Weak productivity didn’t cause the current problems facing Australian workers (falling real wages, high interest rates, unaffordability of essentials like housing and energy). Nor will higher productivity fix these problems.

    Faith that higher productivity will automatically trickle down, to be shared by all workers, is unfounded. Pro-active measures to lift wages and living standards are needed if stronger productivity growth is to support stronger living standards.

    This report presents empirical evidence showing that productivity growth in recent decades has not been equally reflected in higher real wages and better living standards.

    • Productivity grew four times faster since 2000 than average wages adjusted for consumer prices; it grew almost twice as fast as average wages adjusted for producer prices.
    • If workers had received wage increases since 2000 that matched productivity growth, wages would be as much as 18% higher than they are at present – worth $350 per week, or $18,000 per year.
    • Over time, the failure of wages to keep up with productivity has created a “productivity debt” effectively owed to workers, worth hundreds of thousands of dollars per worker.

    The fruits of productivity growth have been disproportionately captured in the form of business profits, dividend payouts, and executive compensation. It is only through deliberate measures to ensure productivity growth is reflected in improved compensation and conditions for workers that Australian workers can have any confidence their contributions to improved productivity will pay off in better lives. Repairing the link between productivity and mass prosperity, by strengthening the institutions of distribution and pushing wealth downward (rather than hoping it will trickle down automatically), is as important to Australia’s future productivity as any labour-saving technological breakthrough.

    The report concludes with a broad agenda of high-level policy themes that should be pursued to challenge and support Australian workplaces to become more productive – and to ensure the resulting gains are broadly shared.

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