The good news: JobKeeper is safe until next year, with parliament just now signing off on the an extension to the program. The bad news: payments will drop gradually over the coming months, based off how much you work.
The $100 billion package means JobKeeper will last until at least the end of March 2021, however the current rate of $1,500 per fortnight will only be around until the end of next month.
“It’s always been a temporary, targeted program, and it has always been scalable,” Treasurer Josh Frydenberg told reporters late on Tuesday afternoon.
“We have expanded and extended this program based on the circumstances that we find ourselves in.”
From September 28 onwards, the rate will fall to $1,200 for people who work more than 20 hours a week, and to $750 for people who work less than that.
Then, from January 4 onwards, the rate will again drop to $1,000 per fortnight for people working 20 hours a week or more, and $650 per fortnight for those working less.
The expectation is that this should’t affect your pay cheque. As the JobKeeper payments to businesses decrease, it’s hoped employers will be able to make up the difference and keep paying their full, usual wages.
The changes come as the government looks to cut back on the huge amounts of money it’s been spending so far this year. At the same time, it’d be crazy to cut off the payments when Victoria is still in lockdown and other states are also hurting economically.
In fact, the Treasury reckons there’ll be more people on JobKeeper in Victoria alone than in the rest of Australia combined.
Employers will also have to demonstrate that they’re still suffering financially from the pandemic. Most businesses will have to re-apply and show a 30% loss in turnover, while businesses which turn over more than $1 billion in revenue each year will have to show losses of at least 50%.
If things still aren’t up and running again by March, we may need to hope for yet another extension. But for now, at least, JobKeeper is sticking around.
