Essential workers would need to spend two-thirds of their income on rent to be able to afford to live alone, according to a new report, with aged care workers, early childhood educators, and hospitality workers among the hardest hit.
The findings come from a new report published by Everybody’s Home, which compares the award wages of essential workers across 15 categories with average rental prices in Australia.
It highlights that for single, full-time essential workers, there is no region of Australia where they could afford to live alone.
For example, a hospitality worker living in a capital city would need to spend 81 per cent of their income to rent a unit by themselves, according to the average capital city rental price of $572 per week. An aged care worker would have to spend 77 per cent of their income on rent, while a nurse would need to spend 71 per cent of their income.
Essential workers who receive slightly higher wages, like firefighters, school teachers, and ambulance officers, would still need to spend the majority of their wage on rent to live alone, and would be considered to be in “rental stress”.
The situation is more pronounced in Sydney, the most expensive capital city, where an aged care worker living alone would need to pay 87 per cent of their income on rent. For a hospitality worker, this increases to 91 per cent.
Everybody’s Home suggests that essential workers in Australia who live alone are likely to be in “serious financial distress”, with little to no savings, while those who live with a partner are likely to be financially dependent on their partner’s income.
There are concerns that essential workers have been priced out of housing in their own communities.
“Essential workers are the backbone of our communities, yet they are being priced out of them because of the unsustainable rises in rents. More and more essential workers are being pushed into serious rental stress,” Everybody’s Home spokesperson Maiy Azize said.
“Virtually no region in Australia is affordable for our aged care workers, early childhood carers, cleaners, nurses and many other essential workers we rely on.
“So many essential industries are facing workforce shortages with workers unable to afford to stay or move to parts of the country where these shortages are at their worst.”