HOW much does a single adult need to live on?

According to a survey of 500 Australians conducted for the Australia Institute, the amount, when averaged, is $454 a week - about $65 a day.

When 500 people in a separate survey were asked how much unemployed Australians should get from Centrelink they settled on $329 a week, or $47 a day.

But the less-impressive truth is the Newstart allowance peaks at $243 a week - $34.70 a day.

''Most Australians have little idea what unemployed Australians actually get,'' the executive director of the Australia Institute, Richard Denniss, said when releasing the survey results. ''They know what their own cost of living is and they think unemployed Australians should get something approaching it, but they would be shocked to find out what a Newstart recipient actually got.''