Australians have fewer friends and are delaying retirement more than ever before.
These are some of the findings from the latest Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey, released this week.
Researchers have interviewed the same group of 17,000 Australians every year from 2001 about their finances, family and social life, and physical and mental health.
The latest analysis looks at 2023 results. Here’s what they found.
Retirement
On average, one in three Australians in their late 60s are still working.
In 2003, the average age Australians were retiring was 59 for women and 60 for men. By 2023, it was 64 for women and 65 for men.
“The gradual rise in the Age Pension eligibility age to 67 years, coupled with broader shifts in workforce participation, has led many Australians to remain in the labour force longer,” the report says.
Health remained the most frequently cited reason for retirement in the 2023 dataset.
Friendships
The report found increasingly few respondents agree with the statement “I seem to have a lot of friends.”
Lead author Dr Inga Lass told TDA socialising took “a huge hit” during the pandemic and “hasn’t really recovered”.
“People are now used to staying more at home and interacting with people on a digital basis,” Lass said.
The sharpest decline since 2001 was for those under 25, though young men still reported having more friends than older men. Among women, those over 65 reported having the most friends.
Income
Australians are now paying the highest average rate of income tax in more than two decades, with the mean rate at 11.7% in 2023.
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The median and average household income has also slid backwards in recent years, dropping from a peak in 2021.
Single parent households were the worst off in 2023, with nearly a third living below what HILDA defined as the poverty line (less than $50k annually for a single parent with two children).
Cost of living
Cost of living remained a major issue for Aussie households, with the largest expense (in dollars spent) being housing and groceries.
The survey has asked questions about everyday expenses since 2006. Since that time, rent has seen the biggest jump, growing by 40.5%.
On the other side, children’s clothing saw the largest drop, falling 29.2% when compared to 2006 levels.
Parenting
The survey found 14% of women and 15% of men did not want to have any children, a significant jump from 2006.
Dr Lass told TDA the “cost and challenges associated with having children” have become increasingly important “in the minds of potential parents.”
The average family is now spending $171 a week on childcare, nearly $100 more than two decades ago. The report also showed that the median household spends 6.3% of their disposable income on childcare costs, up 40% from the early 2000s.
Time stress
Time stress (often or almost always feeling rushed) has increased to almost pre-pandemic levels.
In 2023, close to 40% of women reported frequent time stress, while around 30% of men did. This gap has been consistent over the previous two decades.
Despite this increase, Australians are spending less time commuting than before COVID-19.
Workers in Sydney reported the longest commute, an average of 59 minutes. The all-time high was 73 minutes in 2019.
