AIHW Bulletin | Australia’s welfare 2025

Hi everyone,

Welcome to a very special edition of The Bulletin – your go-to source for the latest data updates on a range of health and welfare topics in Australia.

Today’s special edition is centred around the release of the AIHW’s latest flagship report Australia’s welfare 2025, which was published yesterday. The report gives us a clear snapshot of how Australians are faring – not just in terms of services and supports, but our overall wellbeing. It also highlights the importance of having strong, reliable data to guide decisions that affect all of us.

The AIHW publishes Australia’s welfare every 2 years and Australia’s health in the alternate years. Yesterday's report marks the 17th edition of the Australia’s welfare series. This year’s Australia’s welfare comes in 2 formats: a short 'in brief' report that highlights the key findings and a collection of over 30 online topic summaries for those who want to dive deeper into the data.

Since 1993, this series has been a trusted source of welfare insights – and this year’s edition is no different – helping policymakers, service providers and communities make better decisions that contribute to better outcomes for Australians.

This edition of The Bulletin will present some of the key themes in Australia’s welfare 2025. We encourage you to read the report in full.

Warm regards,

Dr Zoran Bolevich

How is Australia faring in welfare?

• Generally, Australians continue to have positive community connections, give back through volunteering and enjoy a socially cohesive society.
• Australia’s education system remains strong. In 2024, most 4-year-olds attended preschool, school attendance in Years 1–10 was high, Year 12 attainment continued to rise and more people aged 15–74 held non-school qualifications. Around 3.2 million were studying, with more females than males.
• Australia has record high employment rates and some of the lowest rates of unemployment in recent history. Increasing female employment rates have helped drive higher employment levels over the last 50 years.
• Real household income has grown between 2023 and 2024, after 2 years of declines, but around 1 in 5 people aged 15 and over are now experiencing financial stress – the highest in over a decade.
• The proportion of the population receiving income support has been falling since 2012; declining faster for older Australians than for younger people.
• 1 in 5 (20%) adults had experienced physical and/or sexual family and domestic violence since the age of 15.
• Fewer young people own their own home. The financial burden of home ownership has grown, with substantially higher house prices and increases to interest rates in recent years. While interest rates eased in early 2025, many low-income households are in housing stress, spending more than 30% of their income on housing costs.
• More households are receiving government housing assistance. There are more social housing dwellings, but the supply has not kept pace with the growing number of households across Australia.
• Demand for aged care is rising as Australia’s population ages, with government spending increasing over the past 5 years. More people are now using home care than permanent residential aged care.
• The number of Australians with disability is increasing, so too is the number of people supported by the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS). Rates of educational attainment and labour force participation among people with disability have also increased.
• Among First Nations people, there has been an increase in the number of children enrolled in preschool, increasing proportions of young adults attaining Year 12 or an equivalent qualification and growing numbers of students completing higher education courses.
• Home ownership and employment rates for First Nations people have also increased.

How does welfare in Australia compare with other countries?

Australia compares well internationally with other countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), ranking more favourably on many welfare measures such as tertiary education, employment and life expectancy.

Based on the latest year of data, Australia ranks as follows:

• Australia ranks 6th highest in tertiary education attainment among people aged 25–64 (51.4%, higher than the OECD average of 40.7%).
• Australia ranks 7th highest in life expectancy at birth (83.2 years, higher than the OECD average of 81.0 years).
• Australia ranks 7th highest in employment among people aged 15–64 (77.3%, higher than the OECD average of 72.1%).
• Australia ranks 7th highest in household disposable income (US$42,940, higher than the OECD average of US$34,708).

However, Australia ranks less favourably on other measures:

• Australia ranks 1st in the gender gap in feeling safe (31.7 percentage points, higher than the OECD average of 14.4 percentage points). In Australia, 85% for men reported feeling safe when walking alone at night compared with 53% for women. Whereas the OECD average was 82% for men and 68% for women.
• Australia ranks 8th highest in housing costs (price to income ratio of 121.0, higher than the OECD average of 111.7).

Explore Australia’s welfare suite of products:

• Australia’s welfare in-brief – presents a snapshot of selected key findings, offering a point-in-time overview of how Australia is faring.
• Australia’s welfare: topic summaries – a collection of more than 30 web pages providing a comprehensive coverage of statistics on welfare services, Australians’ welfare and wellbeing and ongoing data improvement activities.

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