Third of Aussies would not survive on savings if they lost their job

I read this artice online this morning:

Third of Aussies would not survive on savings if they lost their job
http://www.news.com.au/business/money/story/0,28323,25784706-5017313,00.html
"MORE than a third of Australians would not survive on their savings for more than a month if they lost their jobs. Debt collection agency Dun and Bradstreet's latest consumer credit survey found many Australians were unprepared for financial hardships associated with redundancies and sackings. The survey examined plans for savings, credit use, spending and debt in the coming three months, the Herald Sun reports.Four in 10 people said their savings would last only 30 days if they lost their job, while 38 per cent said they would have to use credit cards to cover household bills and other essential expenses. D&B chief executive Christine Christian said the people struggling most were households earning $30,000 to $60,000 a year and aged between 18 and 49. "There is a very large demographic of people who are first home buyers who have taken advantage of the government's first home owners scheme and many of them are feeling quite pressured at the moment," Ms Christian said.

"They're OK at managing their mortgage repayments in these unusually low interest rate times, but if they were to lose their job, that would be dire for many." Social researcher David Chalke said the results were not surprising. "Many people in the younger demographics have not built up any liquid assets," Mr Chalke said. "They either put their cash into superannuation or bricks and mortar and you cannot cash either of them in." Mr Chalke said younger people had buffers against running out of cash. "About a third of 18 to 34-year-olds live at home and another third could move home if money became really tight," he said. Ms Christian said people should look at preparing a budget, changing insurance payments so they were more frequent and smaller and paying close attention to bills."


This doesn't surprise me. A lot of people live paycheck to paycheck, and until the global financial crisis, job loss probably wasn't a possibility for a lot of people. On the one hand, I'm prepared for the fact that my contract may not be renewed in February '10; but on the other hand, my emergency fund at the moment won't exactly last long! I'm in the category of 18-34 year olds mentioned in the article that could move back home if I really had to, but I would have a lot more chance of getting another job in the state I'm in now rather the state my Mum lives in.