This report recommends a change to the way consumers pay for the network that carries electricity from generators to homes, so that it better reflects the cost of running the network. Overview Australians are paying too much for power. In the five years to 2013, the average household power bill rose 70 per cent: from...

It’s not uncommon to hear that the cost of living in Australia – and Sydney in particular – is among the highest in the world. And in exploiting our fear of hip-pocket pain, politicians and the media have fuelled our sense that keeping up with day-to-day expenses is getting harder and harder.

The LivingStandardsNZ Workshop brought together 28 young people to consider living standards in New Zealand. On Tuesday the 3rd of December, participants attended the day-long Government Economics Network (GEN) Conference at Te Papa (699). Following the Conference, there was a two-day workshop where participants explored ‘policy knots’, using the Treasury’s Living Standards Framework (LSF) to...

Abstract NATSEM’s quarterly Household Budget Report introduces new national measures of cost of living and standard of living for Australian households. The report broadens the cost of living debate by the inclusion of household incomes into a new standard of living index. This new quarterly report provides new insights into the movement of the cost...

This paper analyses the circumstances that led to people being disconnected from utilities, the impacts of disconnection, and how people manage to finance reconnection. It is based on 171 surveys and four interviews with consumers disconnected in the second half of 2012. Findings are compared with Cut Off survey results from 2004 and 2008, noting...