Living standards for poorest 4.5% to decline next 10yrs - Abbott's welfare changes

With the mining boom over and Team Abbott fucking up the economy over the last two years, things are looking bleak for the projected outlook for Australia's next ten years. It's looking the worst though for the poorest Australians who rely on certain types of welfare to get by, with their meager living standards actually falling by 4.5% over that time.

Why? Because of the demonisation by Team Abbott of anyone on welfare, who in the last two budgets have succeeded in making cuts to some areas of welfare payments despite all the opposition. 

But just staying flat would be great for the poorer households. Those in the second-poorest 20% of households are expected to see their standard of living fall by 1.3%, while the poorest can expect a 4.5% decline over the next 10 years. 

The big drivers of the difference are lower economic growth and weaker wage growth over the next 10 years than was experienced from 2004 and, crucially, the changes to welfare benefits in the 2014 and 2015 budgets. 

Among these changes were “the removal of some welfare payments, reductions in other payments, and changes to indexation arrangements that reduce some payment increases over time”. more

Such is the damage left by two years of Abbott. I can't imagine Turnbull doing anything about it either; he's reintroducing the cut to the dole bill to try to make people wait 4 weeks to get a cent.