When the latest census data revealed women typically do the lion’s share of unpaid domestic work, Professor Leah Ruppanner wasn’t exactly surprised.
“We have documented these trends for decades – enough. Now it is time for action,” writes Ruppanner, who researches gender and inequalities. Australia urgently needs policies “that allow men to step into care-giving roles without fear of retribution and penalty at work,” she says.
The latest census results also revealed the number of Australians who selected “no religion” has risen again to 38.9%, up from 30.1% in 2016. This makes them the second-largest “religious group” after Christians, who make up 43.9% of the population (down from 52.1% in 2016). This shift, explains Renae Barker, is reflected in laws around issues such as marriage equality, abortion access and euthanasia.
The census also shows the First Nations population has increased by about 25% since 2016. However, writes Bronwyn Carlson, there’s a lack of detail around other facets of Indigenous lives, including family systems.
To get your head around some of the other interesting, illuminating (and occasionally depressing) stats in the 2021 census, we’ve put together eight charts that will give you a quick snapshot.
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Sunanda Creagh
Senior Editor
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Wes Mountain, The Conversation
A growing, more diverse population, less religion, more First Nations people and a picture of the long-term health of Australians. But who’s doing the housework?
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Leah Ruppanner, The University of Melbourne
We must redress the challenges of unpaid domestic work and the mental load on women’s physical, mental and economic health and well-being.
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Renae Barker, The University of Western Australia
An ongoing shift in Australia’s religious demographics is playing out in our laws. Perhaps the most obvious example is marriage equality.
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Bronwyn Carlson, Macquarie University
The census includes an increase in the number of people who identify as Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander, but it lacks details about other ways they may identity and how they live.
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Sukhmani Khorana, Western Sydney University
More than half of us are either born overseas or have a parent who was born overseas.
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Uri Gal, University of Sydney
American women are deleting period trackers after the end of Roe v. Wade, but evading digital surveillance will be almost impossible without changes to privacy regulations.
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Joanne Watson, Deakin University
The real Pennhurst – a hospital name-checked in the latest series of Stranger Things – was a place of segregation and abuse.
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Paul Strangio, Monash University
The hardest thing for an ageing government is to remake itself. On balance, last week’s developments in Spring Street represent the first step towards Victorian Labor performing that elusive feat.
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Ayesha Scott, Auckland University of Technology
Over two-thirds of Kiwis are worried they won’t be able to retire. KiwiSaver was supposed to help but the reality is many will still fall well short of what is needed to live comfortably past 65.
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Politics + Society
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Michelle Grattan, University of Canberra
Australians are becoming more fearful in an insecure world, and want to see the country armed up, favouring more defence spending and the planned acquisition of nuclear-powered submarines.
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Health + Medicine
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Mischa Bongers, CQUniversity Australia
Knowing where your pelvic floor is and how to exercise it properly can help male incontinence – and might even have some happy side effects.
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Dougal Sutherland, Te Herenga Waka — Victoria University of Wellington
Health organisations must play their part in preventing burnout and moral injury in workers. Most factors leading to it – such as lack of resources and staff – are outside the control of individuals.
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Science + Technology
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Isaac Alan Robert Kerr, Flinders University
A peculiar giant kangaroo that once lived in New Guinea would have descended from a much more ancient form that migrated from Australia, between 5 million and 8 million years ago.
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Education
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Allan Dale, James Cook University
It’s not the first time Australian schools have been given a choice of a religious school chaplain or a secular welfare officer, and for some schools the decision can be divisive.
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Arts + Culture
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Jennifer Hamilton, University of New England; Christina Kenny, University of New England; Felicity Joseph, University of New England; Matt Allen, University of New England
Heteropessimism is an attitude of disappointment, embarrassment or despair at the state of heterosexual relations – specifically about being in one.
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Portia Dilena, La Trobe University
For mature-age students of the Study Centre in the 1970s, education offered them a new life.
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Books + Ideas
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Penni Russon, University of Technology Sydney
Two radically inventive new works of Australian graphic nonfiction dig deep into 21st-century life. They balance critique with hopeful possibilities – of collective change and radical acceptance.
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