Inequality in Income and Wealth Australia

An area of social service payments in Australia that has a distribution function is:

• Family Allowances
• Single Parent Benefits
• Aged Pensions
• All of the Above

A common measure of poverty is

• Lorenz Curve
• Income Gap Index
• GDP Per Capita
• Shadow Prices

What is the main reason put forward as to why inequalities of income should be maintained?

• Very few people actually starve in Australia
• Women are discriminated against in the distribution of income
• Inequality rewards inititiave and promotes incentives
• Inequalities can be reduced through redistribution

What would it mean if the redistribution of income leaves the top 20% of income earners with less than 20% of total income

• The top 20% of income earners must have lower standard of living
• The lowest 20% of income earners must have higher standards of living
• The lowest 80% of income earners must be relatively better off
• The distribution of income must be more equal

Real GDP per capita figures tell us nothing about a nations

• standard of living
• income distribution
• rate of economic growth
• level of economic development

The Government could encourage income earners to prepare for their retirement by

• indexing pensions
• extending people working age
• providing tax incentives for people to take out superannuation policies when they commence work
• developing age care facilities

In Australia, the poverty line is:

• the cost incurred for buying basic needs
• the minimum award wage
• the income that provides a minimum standard of acceptable living for a family
• the number of people classed as poor

A situation in which a pensioner loses considerable amount of income through tax and loss of pension if they take a part time job

• an equivalence scale
• vertical equity
• a poverty gap
• a poverty trap

Indexation of pensions means that they are

• means tested for income and assets
• adjusted for changes in average weekly earners
• kept at a rate just above the poverty line
• increased regularly in line with CPI increases

Relative poverty is a situation in which

• poverty in one country compated with that of another
• the incidence of poverty is measured relative to a standard unit of measure
• people level of poverty is measured relative to their income distribution
• deprivation is extreme because people do not have access to basic needs