One in three Canberrans lining up for food relief have never sought charity aid before, new data suggests.
Food-aid provider OzHarvest, which collected the data, also says the number of ACT residents seeking help has almost doubled over the past six months.
Among those in need is mother-of-two Shannon Wood, whose family had been able to live comfortably on a public-service wage — until now.
"On paper, you look and go, 'You guys have got a good income,' but when you break it down, the reality is unfortunately it's not enough," Ms Wood says.
Her latest haul at Helping Hands, a weekly food pantry in Canberra's northern suburbs, cost her $8.60, saving her about $100.
The small grocer offers milk, bread and vegetables for free, and a kilogram of chicken for as little as $2. The rest of the bill is calculated on weight.
Helping Hands markets itself as helping people "finding it difficult to make ends meet" — a category more people are falling into for the first time, Ms Wood says.
They call themselves "the in-betweeners"; people who earn too much to be eligible for government benefits, but not enough to be financially secure.
"If the car breaks down or you get an unexpected bill that's rather large, you're in a lot of trouble," Ms Wood says.
"We’ve never taken the kids on holiday, we only have one 20-year-old car, and my husband catches public transport.
"What more can we do because obviously what we're doing isn't enough."
Australians' purchasing power has plummeted
Ms Wood also buys second-hand clothes, cashes in recyclable cans and minimises driving to save petrol.
She says she's worried about how families earning even less cope.
"There are some families out there who have two incomes, and even still that's not enough," she says.
Australians' real income levels — wages adjusted for inflation — fell more in the past 12 months than they did in the past 40 years, Australian National University economist Ben Phillips says.
"Inflation has been so high … we've had a big decrease in disposable income, which has gone down by about 6 per cent over 2022," Dr Phillips says.
"So purchasing power has gone backwards … more so than any other time in recent history."
Middle-income earners living 'pay cheque to pay cheque'
Helping Hands pantry coordinator Robyn Wall says rising prices are burning a hole in the pockets of "people who've never had to seek help before".
"They don't like it, there's some embarrassment, certainly," she says.
Incomes in Canberra tend to be higher than elsewhere in Australia, and the ACT has the nation's lowest jobless rate.
But Ms Wall disagrees with the notion that Canberrans are wealthy.
"It's hidden because the numbers tell one story but those numbers don't apply across the whole population," she says.
OzHarvest says 31 per cent of its clients over the past six months has never sought food relief before.
"We have people out there working with two incomes in the family [lining up]," OzHarvest's Canberra City manager Belinda Barnier says.
The results of a survey it conducted in March showed a 73 per cent increase in demand over the past six months.
"Families are consistently, by far, the largest cohort of people seeking support … even people who have two incomes in the family," Ms Barnier says.
She is urging the federal government to use next month's budget to address what OzHarvest says are the main cost of living pressures: housing affordability and grocery prices.
"There seems to be no end to it," she says.
