Let pensioners
work!
Allowing pensioners to work and keep their pension will help retain older workers in critical sectors, such as aged care and agriculture – help us make it happen.
The issue
We need to retain older workers throughout the economy, but especially in the care sector, to meet desperate workforce shortages.
What we are calling for
Employment income should be exempt from the income test for all pensioners, especially those working in the care economy (aged, disability, child care).
The benefits
This will give older people greater income and retain more people in the workforce to address high job vacancies.
Case study
Heather is 68. She works casually as a registered nurse with home care provider My Care Solution. She'd be happy to work additional hours. Her employer would welcome her increased availability. Heather wants to work more hours to boost her income. But she finds the 50c in the dollar punitive and the Centrelink reporting burdensome.
Heather would be willing to increase her availability if she knew she wasn't going to be penalised. This would also help her grow her relatively low superannuation balance.
For working pensioners:
- increases both income and savings of low-wealth pensioners, particularly women
- provides social and emotional benefits from ongoing workforce engagement
For aged care
- will boost workforce participation helping to meet growing demand for care workers.
For the economy:
- by encouraging ongoing workforce participation this will addresses workforce shortages
- pensioners earning additional income would pay additional income tax, offsetting additional pension costs.
In New Zealand, pensioners are not penalised for earning additional income.
If Australia had a participation rate of over 65s similar to New Zealand’s 24.8%, it would result in an additional 450,000 available workers.
Donate
National Seniors is the leading not-for-profit organisation fighting for a fair go for older Australians.
We rely on people like you to donate so we can continue to tackle issues such as age discrimination, accessible housing, pension poverty, health costs, aged care, improve retirement income and provide more home care places so that older Australians can live safely and make ends meet.
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