How pensioners, the disabled and underemployed could plug the workforce shortages

National Seniors Australia is running a Let Pensioners Work! Campaign, pointing out that pensioners are discouraged from paid work because they lose 50c in the dollar once they earn more than the threshold, which recently increased to $190 a fortnight for singles and $336 a fortnight for couples.

In Australia, only 76,000 of the 2.6 million people on the age pension do any paid work. National Seniors Australia estimates this could rise to 400,000, if pensioners could earn employment income without losing their benefits.

Only 14 per cent of Australians aged 65 or over work compared with 25 per cent in New Zealand, where pensioners are not penalised for employment income.

Yusuf Hussain, 71, from Sydney’s inner west is on the age pension. He rents a room in a boarding house and finds it hard to afford fresh food.

Hussain would love to return to working part-time in a call centre doing administration work, but the pension rules make it too hard.

“Most employers don’t want you just one day a week, they want you at least two or three days a week for part-time work,” Hussain said. ”Also, when you work, you have to deal with Centrelink, and I’ve not found that a good experience.“

A retired high school maths teacher who asked to remain anonymous said he used to take casual shifts to help plug shortages at his local school in regional NSW, but had to stop because the financial penalties were too high.

Several employers in aged care and disability support – two of the sectors with the biggest workforce shortages – are keen to employ more older workers.

Georgia Downes, chief executive of home care service provider Home Instead said liberalising the pension rules would make a massive difference to her business.

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“We have a significant number of our existing caregivers who are on the pension … and they can’t do any more hours because they can only earn [up to the threshold],” Downes said.

“They have vim and vigour, they have a passion for their clients and for caring in the community, and they’re being held back.”

Mark Townend, chief executive of Spinal Life Australia, said he could fill 100 positions tomorrow if the pension rules were changed.

However, he said increasing work visas would not solve workforce shortages in disability support because many clients lived in regional areas, while immigrants preferred to move to big cities.

Buchanan said people with disabilities represented another huge, underused workforce. About 200,000 workers with mild disabilities – such as people who use hearing aids or walking sticks – could be used, while there were also hundreds of thousands of people with more severe disabilities who had at least partial work capability.

ABS figures show only 47.8 per cent of working-aged people with disability are employed, compared with 80.3 per cent without disability. The gap of 33.5 percentage points is far higher than in most European countries.

Ross Joyce, chief executive of the Australian Federation of Disability Organisations, said most small to medium-sized businesses did not realise that employing people with disabilities came at no cost to the employer because the government paid for the appropriate equipment, such as screen readers for people with low-vision or desk adjustments.

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