Notes on the data: Aboriginal families

Aboriginal jobless families with children aged less than 15 years, 2021

Policy context: Families with no employed parent ('jobless families') not only experience substantial economic disadvantage but may also have reduced social opportunities that affect their wellbeing and health. Children who live without an employed parent may be at higher risk of experiencing financial hardship and other disadvantage in the short to medium term. They may not have a role model of employment to follow, and so the joblessness of the parent(s) may mean that such children are more likely to have outcomes such as welfare dependency in the long-term. In some families, the reason the parent is without a job may be to care for children or to undertake study to try to improve the future economic prospects of the household. However, most of the children living without an employed parent live in lone-parent households with limited resources [1].

There were 50,374 Aboriginal jobless families with children aged less than 15 years at the 2021 Census, or 32.0% of all Aboriginal families with children aged less than 15 years. The proportion for the whole population was 11.4% [2].

Reference

Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS). Children without an employed parent [Internet]. In: Measures of Australia's Progress, 2010. (ABS Cat. no. 1370.0). Canberra: ABS; 2010 [cited 2013 Oct 18]. Available from: http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Lookup/by%20Subject/1370.0~2010~Chapter~Children%20without%20an%20employed%20parent%20%284.5.2%29
PHIDU (www.phidu.torrens.edu.au/data) based on the ABS Census of Population and Housing, August 2021

Notes: Aboriginal jobless family: A family with at least one Indigenous person counted at home on Census night and either couple families with children under 15 years in which two persons whose relationship in the household was "husband, wife or partners (including same-sex partners)" reported their labour force status as "unemployed" or "not in the labour force"; or in which the lone parent in the family reported their labour force status as "unemployed" or "not in the labour force".

Geography: Data available by Indigenous Area, Primary Health Network, Quintile of socioeconomic outcomes (based on IRSEO) and Remoteness Area

Numerator: Aboriginal families with children under 15 years in which no parent is employed

Denominator: Total Aboriginal families with children under 15 years

Detail of analysis: Per cent

Source: Compiled by PHIDU based on the ABS Census of Population and Housing, August 2021 (unpublished data)