Roy Morgan Update October 14, 2025: Artificial Intelligence, Charitable Donation and Consumer Confidence

In this week's Market Research Update, we present the latest data on Artificial Intelligence, Charitable Donation and Consumer Confidence.

Welcome to the Roy Morgan Weekly update.

AI, Artificial Intelligence, creates more problems than it solves according to 65% of Australians – that’s up 8% since 2023 – and 25% believe AI presents a risk of human extinction in the next two decades – that’s a 5% increase since 2023.

These are the findings of new research from Roy Morgan undertaken early in October with a nation-wide sample of 3,543 Australians aged 18+.

For details on why we are so concerned, as well as why we value AI, go to our website.

I will point out the emerging concern since 2 years ago is the environmental impact of AI. Australians cite the power, water and emissions burden of vast data centres.

“Artificial intelligence is extremely resource-intensive it’s killing our planet.”

“AI ruins the earth and independent thinking in return for convenience.”

“The water consumption of AI is abhorrent, that problem should be solved first.”

And now, back from the existential threats of AI to the all-important weekly indicator, consumer confidence. ANZ-Roy Morgan Consumer Confidence dropped 2.1 points to 83.0.

This is the lowest Consumer Confidence rating for over a year – since September 2024.

Consumer Confidence has now fallen for two straight weeks after the Reserve Bank left interest rates unchanged.

There were falls across the index with consumers less confident about their personal financial situation and also less optimistic about their prospects for the Australian economy going forward.

Most concerningly, views on the Australian economy have significantly worsened – only 10% of Australians expect ‘good times’ for the economy over the next five years compared to 28% expecting ‘bad times’ – this is the lowest net rating for this question for over 30 years since the early 1990s.

In slightly better news, ANZ-Roy Morgan Inflation Expectations were unchanged this week at 5.2%.

So, Australians are expecting annual inflation of 5.2% each year over the next two years.

According to new data from Roy Morgan, 58% of Australians aged 14+ - an estimated 13.2 million Australians – donated an average of $594 in a 12-month period to charity, contributing approximately $7.9 billion.

Over the last decade the average size of charitable donations has grown significantly.

In 2016 the average donation was $334 and increased to an average of $500 in 2021 – up 50% in five years.

Since the pandemic, the growth in the size of the average donation has continued, but at a slower pace, up $94 to $594 in 2025 – up 19% in the last four years.

Over the same period household incomes have grown by 22% to just under $150,000 per household in June 2025.

This is marginally faster than the growth in average donations over the same period, up $94 to $594, an increase of 19%.

The divergence between the two – which generally track closely together – has really only opened this year.

Six months ago, average charitable donations were increasing at the same pace as household incomes, both rising by 21% from June 2021 to December 2024.

Now to Roy Morgan measures of employment and unemployment – the measure that really matters – and the news has improved in September.

‘Real Unemployment’ dropped in September, down 0.3% to 10.8%, - so, an estimated 1.74 million Australians are unemployed – looking for work.

The main driver of the decrease was a rise in employment – up 103,000 to just over 14.3 million.

The rise was entirely of the part-time employment which increased 105,000 to 5.1 million while full-time employment was virtually unchanged.

In September, there was also good news on under-employment – people wanting to work more hours – which dropped significantly to 1.5 million.

Total unemployment and under-employment – what we might call workforce under-utilisation – dropped 1.9% to 20.1% of the workforce in September – an estimated 3.24 million people.

Although the estimates for September were positive, this remains a high level of overall labour under-utilisation which has now been above 3.2 million for four straight months – the first time this estimate has been so high since August 2020.

And finally, a look at Australia’s A-League – which starts this weekend with a series of matches around Australia.

New research from Roy Morgan shows Sydney FC tops the A-League club supporter ladder with 686,000 fans – over 100,000 more than any other club.

This is not surprising as Sydney FC has been the most successful club in the A-League winning 5 Championships and 4 Premiers Plates since the league began 20 years ago in 2005 – and is also based in Australia’s largest city of Sydney.

There’s a close contest for second between the Brisbane Roar and Melbourne Victory. The Roar has 556,000 supporters and is just ahead of the Melbourne Victory with 531,000 supporters.

The Roar and Victory have also been two of the most successful clubs in the league over the last 20 years.

Importantly, success matters – the two clubs to increase their supporter bases by the most in the last five years since 2020 – are the Central Coast Mariners and Melbourne City.

The Central Coast Mariners have more than doubled their supporter base since 2020 to 197,000 supporters – and have won two Championships recently in 2023 and 2024.

In addition, support for Melbourne City has increased by nearly 80% since 2020 to 292,000 – the second largest increase.

Melbourne City are the current A-League Champion for 2025.