We are not all born equal. Circumstances not of our own making factor heavily in the opportunity and quality of life we lead.
Activism addressing issues of social inequality such as gender pay, disability employment and recognition of our First Peoples has created a better and more inclusive society.
While much more needs to be done, there is a ready acceptance by most Australians that policies which discriminate against a person based on gender, race, disability or religion, are wrong.
However, when it comes to economic policies that favour one group of people ahead of another we seem less concerned. Economic inequality, whether deliberate or as a consequence of the operation of the market, seems somehow okay.
Governments have recognised that power imbalances exist in our market-based economy, and have enacted legislative protections in areas such the labour market. However, such laws only provide minimum safeguards.
Our legislators seem reticent to tackle the economic policies that create or entrench economic inequality. How is it for example that we allow investors to leave units vacant in the Docklands while young people struggle to access the housing market in Melbourne? Or force the employees of charities to bear the risk of government policies of marketisation and competition in the social services sector through the casualisation of their employment?
Or require students to carry the burden of debt for undertaking tertiary studies, while allowing multinational companies to construct their financial affairs to pay little or no tax in Australia? Or permit the government to provide businesses tax relief while implementing cuts to welfare payments and supports?
"It seems that our poor, vulnerable, sick and aged have a place in our society, and it is at the bottom of the pile."
Inequality was a hot issue in 2017, and will continue to be. In July, speaking at the Melbourne Institute, Opposition Leader Bill Shorten said: 'We need a new focus on the biggest threat to our health as an economy and our cohesion as a society: inequality.'
In doing so, he marked out his party's agenda to arrest inequality in all its forms, particularly economic policies that give primacy to those with wealth at the expense of those without.
The government however would have none of this talk of inequality. Treasurer Scott Morrison accused Shorten of 'producing an economic program based on the narrow lens of envy'. In his speech to the Australian Industry Group in Adelaide, Morrison backed his argument with the following points:
Between 2011 and 2014, the Gini coefficient for household disposable income decreased from 0.311 to 0.299.
The Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey has shown relatively little change in household income inequality between the endpoint of 2001 and 2014.
Analysis released in 2015 showed while income inequality has risen in most OECD countries over the past three decades, in Australia it had increased by substantially less than many comparable OECD countries.
And the poorest 20 per cent of households, on average, receive cash transfers and social services benefits worth more than eight times what they pay in taxes.
Morrison concluded with an all too familiar government catch cry: 'Grow our economy and ensure that all Australians get a fair go.'
There are two propositions underpinning Morrison's position. First, Australia does not have an inequality problem. Second, if there is inequality, we can rely on the neoliberal formula and trickle-down economics to deliver everyone the prosperity they seek.
Pope Francis has a different view of the prevailing economic paradigm. He states the assumption 'that economic growth, encouraged by a free market, will inevitably succeed in bringing about greater justice and inclusiveness in the world' has 'never been confirmed by the facts' and 'expresses a crude and naïve trust in the goodness of those wielding economic power ... Meanwhile, the excluded are still waiting.'
Indeed, to deny the existence of economic inequality denies the lived experience of millions of Australians who struggle to put food on the table and provide their families with safe, secure housing.
To state that the poorest 20 per cent of households, on average, receive cash transfers and social services benefits worth more than eight times what they pay in taxes is to traverse a well-worn and offensive path that we are a society of lifters and leaners.
It seems that our poor, vulnerable, sick and aged have a place in our society, and it is at the bottom of the pile. Their value is not measured in terms of human dignity and social contribution but in terms financial cost, to be supported only if we can afford to do so.
We have given legislators a free pass when it comes to economic policies that discriminate against those without means. This creates systemic inequality, and it needs to be addressed urgently.
Joe Zabar is the Director of Economic Policy for Catholic Social Services Australia and author of An Economy that works for All (Australian Catholic Social Justice Council, 2017). This is an edited extract from his presentation to the Catholic Social Services annual conference in Melbourne, February 2018. Read the full text here