One in two Australian voters is fully reliant on public welfare, by Adam Creighton and Sid Maher.
Nearly half of voters in the looming federal election will rely entirely on government payments for their incomes, confronting Scott Morrison with a demographic and political powder keg as he frames a May 3 budget relying on spending restraint to rein in the deficit.
Analysis by The Weekend Australian has revealed that more than 44 per cent of voters, almost 6.4 million people, are either public sector employees (1.89 million) or wholly dependent on federal government pensions, allowances and parenting payments (4.48 million). The figure grows further when private sector workers who receive more in welfare than they pay in tax are added.
The big picture background is the orgy of money manufacture that constitutes the massive build up of money and bank credit since 1982 (we talk about “trillions” now, when “billions” seemed huge 20 years ago, and now a mere “million” as big is quaint).
The current size of the welfare state was only made possible by the credit bubble, which stopped growing in the GFC. One way or another (defaults, jubilees, inflation) the bubble of debt will end, and the welfare state will consequently have to be pared back — it’s not sustainable.
