The concept of a welfare pedestal has been popularized by Noel
Pearson. As a lawyer and passionate advocate for the interests
of aboriginal people who live on the Cape York Peninsula of
North Queensland, some readers might expect that he would spend
his time arguing for more government hand-outs to remedy social
problems in aboriginal communities. However, Pearson recognizes
that the welfare programs are actually a major cause of the
social problems in those communities and his main focus is on
finding ways to stop hand-outs from harming his clients. He is
not against government help for his clients, he just wants to
ensure that it does them more good than harm. The insight behind
the welfare pedestal is that welfare payments can provide
perverse incentives by encouraging some people to remain on
welfare rather than to seek paid employment. Over the last
decade or so, concern about an emerging problem of inter-
generational welfare dependency (in non-indigenous communities
as well as indigenous communities) ha