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I was perusing through the interwebs as you do, and came across a very insightful article regarding the wealth or rather, the lack of wealth equality here in Oz.
It’s a joint research study by the University of New South Wales and the Australian Council of Social Service and to be honest, it’s very confronting.
As we know, COVID-19 has exacerbated what was already a burgeoning wealth gap between the haves and have-nots, and this paper only highlights that.
Here are some key take-aways:
Household Wealth
The below compares the wealth holdings of the highest 10% (highest wealth) of households followed by the next 30% (middle wealth) then lowest 60%.
The highest wealth group had 46% of all household wealth and the middle wealth group had 38%, leaving the remaining 60% with just 16%.
Household Income
Next up is household income, which shows that the top 5% of households far out earn every other percentile, as expected.
Editor’s Note: The graph below shows each 20% quintile, with the lowest and top 5% as outliers.
Household Assets
Also interesting to note, is the break-up of net wealth across the quintiles:
You can see that shares, businesses and real estate by far make up the largest percentage of net wealth for those at the top.
And that debt makes up a larger % for those at the bottom.
Also interesting to see that the primary home makes up the largest % for those in the middle.
I think it can be summarized as:
Low wealth: asset poor, cash poor
Middle wealth: asset rich, cash poor
High wealth: asset rich, cash rich
Household Definitions
This one is the most interesting, as it provides the break-down between each different household.
Which one does your family sit?
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COVID-19 has upended our lives across all spectrums, including finances.
And it’s no secret that the very rich have gone even richer, with the Bloomberg Billionaire Index (yes, there’s such a thing), showing that the combined wealth of Aussie billionaires have risen more than FIFTY percent in the past year:
So what is the answer?
Unfortunately, there is none.
We live in an age where money and wealth is earnt and flaunted like never before.
I firmly believed that COVID-19 would have been the catalyst for the Great Reset.
But of course, the governments and central banks needed to do “whatever it takes” to maintain social order and economic stability.
As a result, the wealth gap is going to keep on widening, until one day it’ll just break.
We are miles away from that day of course, so sigh, for the moment – can only keep on keeping on.
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