In Australia, work has long been sold as a pathway to success and stability.
We’re told that grit, commitment and strong work ethic will get you anywhere.
Get a job. Build a life. Move forward. Buy a house. Live the ‘Australian Dream’.
Everyone gets a fair go here, right?
Wrong.
We talk about employment as a key pathway out of homelessness and hardship, but that assumes everyone is starting from roughly the same place. And they’re not.
How can everyone get a fair go when basic human needs aren’t being met, and access to work is increasingly inequitable?
Every week at HoMie, we meet young people who are eager to work – to earn money, build routine, find stability and create a future for themselves that aligns with their aspirations.
And increasingly, I’m watching them try to do that in an economy that rewards stability before it offers it.
Access to safe housing is widely considered a basic human right. Under the housing-first model, we know that prioritising one’s primary needs – ie; stable and secure housing – is the foundational principle for breaking the cycle of long-term homelessness.
By providing stable housing first, individuals are better equipped to tackle their health, social, and economic goals because they operate from a baseline of safety and security (Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute, 2018).
But a huge gap exists between what we know works, and how things are actually playing out.
Right now, young people are navigating one of the toughest housing markets in recent memory. Housing affordability stress among young people has more than doubled over the past decade (Australian Institute of Health and Welfare, 2025). Nearly half of those experiencing persistent homelessness are children and young people. There are more than 25,000 young people across the country experiencing homelessness on any given night.
At the same time, our recent HoMie research found that 56% of Australians believe youth homelessness is the result of personal choice. It’s an alarming, albeit unsurprising, finding.
The young people we work with at HoMie are not “choosing” instability or homelessness. They are in circumstances completely outside of their control – leaving unsafe environments, domestic violence & family breakdowns.
It’s not about personal choice. This cohort of young people are experiencing unique and systemic barriers to employment, often facing intersecting issues like racism, queerphobia and ableism. If all it took was ‘hard work’, the outlook for young people in this country would be vastly different.
It bears the question: How can we expect a young person to pursue employment in the face of homelessness? Can you imagine getting ready for work from the boot of your car? Or not knowing which refuge you’ll be sleeping in until you finish work each day?
It doesn’t take much empathy or understanding to know that a young person’s primary human rights need to be addressed before we can expect them to maintain stable employment. We’re putting the cart before the horse.
This is unfolding against a backdrop of shrinking affordable housing, increasing rents while housing supply continues to fall behind demand. Even young people not facing homelessness are struggling to stay afloat.
These pressures don’t stop at housing. They shape access to employment too. We often talk about work as though opportunity is evenly distributed, but our labour market quietly rewards people who already have their baseline needs met: Stable housing. Reliable transport. Strong support systems. Room to absorb setbacks.
The further away you are from those conditions, the harder it becomes to participate at all.
At the same time, employers themselves are under pressure. Hiring has become more cautious. Businesses naturally gravitate towards certainty – someone with recent experience, someone reliable on paper, someone who feels low risk. While I understand this instinct – over time, it narrows entry points for the same groups of young people, again and again.
In the face of these competing forces, we need to advocate for supported working environments that foster the development of stability, rather than viewing it as a prerequisite.
At HoMie, we’ve seen that supported employment opportunities can create meaningful, lifelong change. Through our Pathway Alliance, we partner with employers including Nike, Bunnings, Sportsgirl and AMX to create supported pathways into employment for young people affected by homelessness and hardship.
These are real jobs with real expectations, designed to meet young people where they are and invest in their potential – not letting them be defined by current circumstances.
Through these programs, young people gain income, confidence, community and momentum. Some move into stable housing for the first time. Some return to study. Others start a new career and pursue reimagined goals. Many leave homelessness behind forever.
Not because expectations were lowered, but because support, understanding and deliberate pathways into work were specifically built in the first place, with their needs front of mind.
That’s the part we need to talk about more honestly.
Because if employment is going to remain one of the key pathways out of homelessness, then we also need to confront how uneven access to work has become – particularly for young people already navigating instability.
Right now, we are still designing systems around the assumption that everyone starts from the same place. They don’t.
And until we become more honest about that, we will keep locking young people out of the very pathways we insist are the solution.