sit-down money

alternative sit down money

1. Australiacolloquialinformaluncountablechiefly Australian AboriginalWelfare or social security, including unemployment benefits, especially such welfare paid to Aboriginal people.

   2005 February 21, Australian Broadcasting Commission, The World Today, transcript, A discussion paper being released today canvasses a number of proposals to transform the payments that have become known as ‘sit-down money’.

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   I have given you examples of some of the reforms we have already put in place which are helping young people, for example, to find jobs instead of getting sit-down money, which they got from Labor.

   1999, Australian Senate, Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), page 9151

   So far be it from wanting sit-down money. More and more Indigenous leaders are telling me that that is what has destroyed their society.

   2006, Australian House of Representatives, Parliamentary Debates (Hansard), volume 279, page 63

   2010, Andrew Stojanovski, Dog Ear Café, ReadHowYouWant, Large Print 16pt, page 105, Meanwhile everyone else in your family is unemployed, getting $400 a fortnight unemployment benefit (which the Warlpiri describe as ‘sit-down money’). As soon as your $600 is in your hand, there are eight people who you are obliged to distribute it to, in the same way that you would have to distribute a kangaroo. When they get paid, they also have to share their sit-down money with each of the others.