A long-term study of 17,500 Australians has revealed the impact of the first year of the pandemic on households, including in Hume and Whittlesea.
Conducted by the Melbourne Institute, the Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey is Australia’s only nationally representative longitudinal household study, and its latest report released on December 5 uses data up until 2020 to show COVID-19’s impact on Australians.
The report showed inequality declined significantly in Australia, with the largest fall in the survey’s 20-year history, as people received income support and other supports to respond to the growing pandemic.
“The results offered important insights into the levels and impact of assistance we provide to the most vulnerable members of our society,“ report leader author Roger Wilkins said.
The report found 45 per cent of Australians said the pandemic made their lives worse.
“Unemployed people, people with disability or mental health concerns, and people who are extroverted were the most likely to feel their lives were much worse because of the pandemic,“ UoM said.
“Melbourne – under protracted lockdown restrictions at the time of the 2020 survey – correspondingly had the highest proportion of people reporting life under the pandemic was much worse—33.1 per cent, compared with 25.4 per cent of people in non-urban Victoria, and 16.9 per cent nationally,“ UoM said.
The report said the onset of the pandemic led to the largest increase in job insecurity in 20 years, with 5.3 per cent of Victorian workers reporting they’d lost their job. Nearly one in 10 Australians were stood down without pay.
