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The Revolution that Faltered: Two Decades of Reform of Australia's Retirement Income System
Author(s) -
Borowski Allan
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
international social security review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.349
H-Index - 28
eISSN - 1468-246X
pISSN - 0020-871X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1468-246x.2005.00225.x
Subject(s) - basic income , realization (probability) , economics , labour economics , market economy , mathematics , statistics
In the 1980s, Australia's retirement income system became the subject of ongoing reform. A number of the reform objectives were quite revolutionary but some remain much further from realization than was expected, with major consequences for future retirees. In this sense, Australia's retirement income revolution has faltered. This paper (1) outlines the main features of Australia's retirement income system prior to the 1980s, (2) presents the reform objectives and explains the sense in which they were “revolutionary”, (3) describes some of the major changes, their achievements, and how and why a number remain further from realization than expected, (4) considers two more recent objectives and (5) outlines the challenges that remain.