A friend of mine recently got a cool thousand dollars in his bank account without knowing why or who. We considered that maybe his mother transferred it in as an early Chrissy present, or maybe just because she was a little high. We also considered that it could be part of Kevin Rudd’s thousand dollar economical security payouts, but given he’s 19 years old and not receiving benefits, it didn’t really seem to fit the bill. I googled Kev’s payout and couldn’t find anything that would indicate that he would be eligible.
Surely enough, though, soon he got a letter in the mail from Centrelink claiming responsibility for the thousand dollar payout. It claimed that he was eligible for this payout because he was receiving Youth Allowance on October the 14th 2008.
I then compared myself, who didn’t get the payout, to my friend who did. He is literally one day younger than me and we have both at one point in time, received Youth Allowance. The only difference between us is that I began full time employment last year and have been working full-time ever since, thus being ineligible for Youth Allowance, while he has a casual job at McDonalds and still gets the benefits.
My point in this rant is; why does the eligibility for this payment depend solely on whether the individual was receiving Youth Allowance on a particular date? Youth Allowance is paid to a variety of people, some mean well and are studying or just doing it tough, but others are just too lazy to get a full time job – and these people will be rewarded with a thousand dollar payout. To me, than plan is a little flawed.
[ED (Kramer) – Not entirely Canberra related, but it’s a really, really slow news day. So back to the beer and prawns!]