Time, not just money

Inequality is usually discussed in terms of income and wealth, but another gap is widening: who has time. In Australia, it is increasingly clear that long hours, unpredictable rosters and multiple jobs create a form of scarcity that shapes health, relationships and civic life as much as pay packets do.[3][1]

Full‑time workers in many sectors face longer or more irregular hours, driven by staffing shortages and cost pressures. Casual and gig workers often sit at the other extreme—too few guaranteed shifts, then sudden bursts of work when it suits employers or platforms, but little control over when those hours fall. Parents juggle paid work with unpaid care, while older people care for partners or grandchildren on top of part‑time jobs. In each case, the issue is not just how much money comes in, but how fragmented the week becomes.[3][1]

Time poverty shows up in small, practical ways. People skip medical appointments because they cannot get time off, defer study because evening classes clash with shifts, or opt out of community roles because they cannot commit to regular meetings. Voting still happens, but following the detail of local planning decisions or service changes becomes harder when attention is split across work, commute and survival tasks.[3][1]

The links to mental and physical health are well documented. Rural health submissions highlight the stress of long travel times to basic services layered on top of work and caring duties, especially when banks, post offices and health providers withdraw from smaller towns. Urban workers face different versions: long commutes, extended childcare days, and the constant pull of digital communication keeping them “on” outside nominal work hours.[3][6]

Policies that talk only about wages or headline employment miss this dimension. Questions about rostering rights, predictable hours, access to leave, investment in local services and transport all feed into whether people have any discretionary time left once the basics are done. Without that margin, even modest expectations—volunteering, sports clubs, school councils, informal support for neighbours—start to look unrealistic.[3][1]

Sources
https://www.salvationarmy.org.au/socialjusticestocktake/act/[1] https://www.ruralhealth.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/NRHA_Sub-Mental_Health_and_Suicide_Prevention_Agrmnt_Rev.pdf[3] https://www.mentalhealthcommission.gov.au/sites/default/files/2025-07/national-report-card-2024_0.pdf[6]