This graph shows the poverty rates, after housing costs have been deducted, as a percentage of all people from 1999-00 to 2017-18. Whilst we focus on the consistent estimates based on the pre-2007 measure by the ABS (lower line), this graph also includes the higher poverty rates derived from the 2007-08 ABS income measure (upper line).

The graph shows how the overall poverty rate fluctuated within a band between 11.5% and 14.5% between 1999-00 and 2017-18. Poverty declined substantially from 13.1% in 1999 to 11.5% in 2003, rose sharply during the boom years to 14.4% just before the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) in 2007, declined to 12.6% in 2009, and since then has risen modestly to 13.1% in 2017-18.