For almost three many years, Australia appeared to have a form of get-out-of-jail card that allowed it to glide by way of the dot-com bust and the worldwide monetary disaster with out a recession, whereas its residents principally loved excessive wages, inexpensive housing and golden prospects.

When a recession did arrive, in 2020, it was due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

However 4 years later, Australia has been unable to shake off among the headwinds, together with a excessive price of residing — the value of bread has risen 24 percent since 2021 — a choppy labor market and rising inequality. Whereas these and related points are additionally troubling nations like Britain and america, they’re significantly stinging to many in Australia, which has lengthy seen itself because the “fortunate nation.”

Australia is among the many wealthiest, most resource-rich and steady international locations on the earth. However hundreds of thousands of residents are experiencing ranges of hardship not seen in lots of many years. They are saying they’re struggling to place meals on the desk, pay for housing and well being care and canopy their utility payments. And lots of younger Australians are confronting a actuality that their ancestors by no means needed to: that they are going to be worse off than their mother and father or grandparents.

Robyn Northam, 28, as soon as dreamed of turning into a hairdresser. However rising hire and exorbitant baby care prices for her two youngsters have put coaching out of attain. Simply two generations in the past, she mentioned, her grandmother raised a household in her own residence as a single mum or dad, whereas working part-time as a nurse.

“For those who’re a median Australian, that’s just about unattainable,” mentioned Ms. Northam, a content material creator in Cairns who, together with her companion, pays 600 Australian {dollars}, or about $400, per week in hire. “It’s a very completely different world now.”

Australians are paying extra for nearly every little thing. The pandemic ushered in hovering inflation, which has since softened, although at 3.4 % it stays comparatively excessive. Rents in some Melbourne neighborhoods are up nearly 50 % year-over-year, and rental affordability is at its lowest in at the least 17 years. Client sentiment has barely budged since tumbling in 2020.

Owners are additionally beneath stress. Australian mortgages are usually fastened for a number of years at a time, and because the central financial institution has tried to rein in costs by elevating rates of interest, charges have tripled to six.7 % in recent times.

This pressure has resulted in a spike in working households looking for assist. Over 16 years, mentioned Dave McNamara, the chief government of Foodbank Victoria, “by way of bush fires and pandemics, I’ve not seen something on the size that we’re presently experiencing of individuals from all walks of life needing meals reduction.”

“Issues are lots worse than they have been prepandemic, and there’s little inspiration for us to be optimistic,” mentioned Nikki Hutley, an impartial economist in Sydney. “Everybody’s doing it actually robust.”

Economists have lengthy argued that an excessive amount of Australian wealth is tied up within the housing market, at the same time as shoddy coverage, development shortages and excessive immigration have introduced an already low housing provide to a crunch level.

Polling by the assume tank Per Capita final 12 months discovered that fewer than one in four Australians who did not own a home anticipated to have the ability to achieve this. “That’s not essentially the be-all and end-all, when you’ve obtained a extremely steady rental system,” mentioned Ms. Hutley, “however now we have horrible legal guidelines on this nation.”

A scarcity of leases has additionally despatched rents skyrocketing in some neighborhoods, pushing younger individuals farther and farther out of cities. In Sydney, the exodus of younger households, one current report warned, dangers making a “metropolis with no grandchildren.”

Talitha Vermeulen, 25, has been seeking to transfer inside that metropolis together with her companion for the final 4 months. Typically, out there properties are leased earlier than viewings may even happen, she mentioned. “It’s simply been irritating to not even get an opportunity to see the place.”

With its wealth, stability and pure sources, Australia has extra benefits than most different nations — life expectancy charges and wages are nonetheless among the many world’s highest, with wage growth outstripping inflation final 12 months. The inventory market is buying and selling close to document ranges.

But it’s not evident that it’s residing as much as its ample potential, mentioned Julianne Schultz, an instructional and the writer of “The Concept of Australia.” “The factor that I preserve coming again to is: It may very well be so a lot better,” she mentioned, including: “It’s a form of lack of ambition.”

Although Australians typically proudly check with “the fortunate nation,” the remark by the tutorial and author Donald Horne was initially supposed as one among reproach to the nation’s leaders, whom he noticed as incurious and unimaginative.

And regardless of the nation’s plentiful bounty and its oft-stated love of egalitarian values, Australia’s wealth is increasingly unevenly distributed, because the nation joins the ranks of others confronting rising inequality and financial and generational strains.

Financial unhappiness has translated to the bottom ranges of “life satisfaction” since information started 22 years in the past, in line with the Australian Unity Wellbeing Index. The excessive price of residing, troubling international politics and rising inequality are all contributing components, mentioned Kate Lycett, the lead researcher. “It’s an enormous variety of people who find themselves struggling to make ends meet,” she mentioned.

On a current Monday morning, individuals waited outdoors a meals financial institution at a church in Richmond, a neighborhood of Melbourne. The meals financial institution helps greater than 100 households, and demand has elevated sharply over the past six months, mentioned Francis Flood, the coordinator.

“We’ve seen lots of people who work however can’t make it by way of to the tip of the month,” he mentioned. “We’re positively serving to individuals who, when you noticed them on the road, you wouldn’t assume can be utilizing a meals financial institution.”

Even some who personal their properties outright are struggling. Tracey Shepherd, 60, lives a brief stroll from the seashore, in picture-perfect Surfers Paradise, Queensland. A former public servant, she has well being points which have made discovering everlasting work a wrestle, and she or he is surviving on her retirement financial savings whereas she awaits a call on a incapacity profit.

With the excessive value of groceries and will increase in upkeep charges on her house, life feels precarious, she mentioned. “After I was youthful, they’d say we’re the fortunate nation. It’s not like that now.”