Survey: More cash, Struggling to pay for basics, but Spending more on fun.
HOUSEHOLDS are pouring half their weekly budget into housing, food and transport.
Health, education, home-loan and food costs have raced ahead of general inflation in recent years in a hip-pocket hit on essential spending.
But the most detailed study of the nation's spending habits also reveals we are not content with only basics, are technology addicts, and reward ourselves with recreation and creature comforts, The Herald Sun reports.
Almost 10,000 households were involved in the survey.
It also showed that spending on recreation was up $47 a week, or 41 per cent, since the last survey six years ago.
The Australian reports one in four households relies on welfare benefits while one in seven is spending more than it earns, as increasing cost-of-living pressures bear down on families.
Of the nation's poorest households, one in 10 went without meals and 7.3 per cent could not afford to heat their homes in winter during 2009-10.
The "financial stress" also afflicted some of the nation's wealthiest people, with almost one in seven high-earning households failing to pay bills on time and 8.8 per cent seeking financial help from friends and family.
The Australian Bureau of Statistics' Household Expenditure Survey, released every six years, shows households nationwide spent an average $1236 a week on goods and services in the year to June 2010.
Key money grabbers include mortgage interest payments ($80.96), rent ($78.18), car purchase ($45.39), petrol ($36.66), meals out ($31.97) and fast food ($30.50).
CommSec chief economist Craig James said an interest-rate cut would be the best way to ease budget pressures.
However, overall people are financially better off and The Sydney Morning Herald reports that household income has climbed 50 per cent since 2003-04, while prices were up 19 per cent.
We are devoting less share of our overall budget to clothes, household appliances and food. Instead, a greater chunk is being directed to recreation, transport and booze.
"It is clear that Australians have continued to get richer over time and thus are spending a greater proportion of their incomes on non-essential goods and services," Mr James said.
Spending on internet charges is up a massive 152 per cent, education 107 per cent, pay TV 95 per cent, childcare 84 per cent, home-loan interest 75 per cent and rent 68 per cent.
Brisbane property consultant Stephen Parker, 49, told The Australian his family, with an annual income of about $150,000 and three children, had to budget carefully.
"Six or seven years ago, you'd have one or two mobile phones per family; now every member's got one," he said.
"We're all hooked up to the internet. It used to be a couple of hundred dollars per month for a family, now it's $1000 for telecommunications . . . Insurance bills - life insurance, motor-vehicle and house and contents - have also gone up by about 30 per cent."
Average weekly spending shot up $343, or 38 per cent, over the six years compared with the inflation rise of 19 per cent. Couples with children spent an average $1748 a week, almost four times as much as elderly singles.
Canberra had the highest spend at $1526.28, compared with $1304.29 in Melbourne. Average household wealth was $729,442, or $285,000 per person, dominated by the value of the family home and superannuation.
Source: www.news.com.au
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