Conspiracy of Silence on Poverty in Australia

Tim Williams of the Australian CM posts this …MELBOURNE, May 8, 2003 (theage.com.au) Few people are aware of just how much the gap between the very rich and the rest has widened in Australia recently. In some circles even making this point exposes you to charges of inciting class warfare or the politics of envy. The top 5 per cent of income earners are doing very well. In the past five years the combined annual income of the top 5 per cent has grown dramatically. The total earnings of this group at $62 billion now outstrip what the entire nation spends on all social security benefits and family payments.

But it is what has happened at the very top that is even more startling. In the past five years the combined annual taxable income of our nation’s millionaires has grown by more than 300 per cent from $1.1 billion to $4.6 billion. These people make in a week – $43,000 – roughly what the average income earner makes in a year. The annual incomes of the top 5 per cent are roughly equivalent to those of the entire bottom 40 per cent. The wealthiest 5 per cent of Australians enjoyed a 28 per cent jump in their earnings in the five years since 1994-95 – an increase of more than $31,000 to $143,843 a year. 

For full story visit http://www.theage.com.au/articles/2003/05/07/1052280321906.html