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More than half of 189,000 New Zealanders on the Jobseeker��benefit��have received it for at least a year, data from the��Ministry of Social Development��(MSD) shows.����

Prime Minister��Christopher Luxon��said in his state of the nation speech last weekend��that the “free ride” was over for beneficiaries who had not adhering to their obligations, vowing to “break the shackles” of��welfare dependency.����

“We’ll do everything we can to help people into work, but if they don’t play ball, the free ride is over,” Luxon said.����

He said he’d��seen enough evidence to prove the use of sanctions should be used more often��up to encourage people to get off the benefit.��

But Labour and the Greens argue the opposite, echoing findings from a group of experts who deemed sanctions to be “problematic” and ineffective at getting beneficiaries into work.��

The latest MSD data from last year shows there are 378,711 people in New Zealand receiving a “main benefit” (an emergency, Jobseeker, sole parent, youth or supported living payment).��

Of these, 189,798 people were on a Jobseeker benefit. Each of these main benefit payments has specific obligations recipients need to adhere to.��

The number of people receiving a main benefit has declined since its Covid-19 peak at the end of 2020 but has been increasing since early 2023.��

There were 108,957, or 57 per cent of the 189,798 people receiving Jobseeker support, who had been receiving it for at least one year, the MSD data showed.��

Most of the people receiving this payment were male (107,130) and the most common age of the recipients was 25-39 (60,561).��

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By region, Northland had the most on a Jobseeker support for more than a year (63 per cent), followed by those living on the West Coast (61 per cent) and Waikato (60 per cent).��

The Jobseeker payment has two sub-categories: “work-ready” - people who are looking or preparing for work; and those with a current medical condition or disability affecting their ability to work.��

Most people who receive the Jobseeker payment for a medical condition or disability were receiving it because they were experiencing a psychological or psychiatric condition (40,479). Similar to the overall main benefit figures, the number of people receiving financial support for this reason has steadily tracked up since mid-2022.��

Modelling��obtained by the��Herald��revealed��earlier this month that expected time on Jobseeker and other main benefits has risen sharply in the past four years.��

Government estimates of the time beneficiaries will spend on��income support��have risen sharply, with recipients of the main Jobseeker payment now expected to spend an average of 13 years on a benefit, according to the modelling.����

The estimated time that work-ready��Jobseeker��recipients will spend on income support until they reach retirement age has jumped by 23 per cent since 2019, amid a slowdown of the benefits system that could strain government finances and trap thousands of people in poverty.����

Long-term estimates for people on��youth benefits��and sole-parent support have increased even more starkly. Hundreds of disadvantaged teens are now expected to spend virtually their entire working lives on a main benefit, at a cost of nearly $1 million each in future payments, according to modelling by actuaries Taylor Fry for the MSD.��

In total, Taylor Fry estimated that 626,000 New Zealanders who received a benefit in the last year will collectively spend another 6.43 million years on income support.��

Julia Gabel is an Auckland-based reporter with a focus on data journalism. She joined the��Herald��in 2020.��