When you look at the government’s budget of R1.56-trillion and you look at what the expenditure is of R418.4-b community and social development versus R183.5-b for economic development, surely you are left with a glaring question.
Is the government really interested in economic development considering that most of the taxes that are collected are generated from business?
Without business, there would be no jobs, therefore no employees, therefore no PAYE and because the people will not be earning any money, there will be less VAT, less tax revenue from petrol and I could go on. Entrepreneurship comes naturally to some and unnaturally to others.
By supporting those that it comes naturally to, you allow sustainable businesses to be built, which then leads to employment and of course more tax revenue collection. It’s a vicious cycle really.
The government cannot create jobs. As much as it believes it can, it cannot. It can create an environment to allow business to excel, but it can also create the environment to make being in business very hard.
Again, it warrants repeating. Business comes naturally to some and to others not and this is why not everyone owns a business and why some people are employees.
Chris Black from the Dynamic Start Up Project has for the past 20 years done a survey in 19 different countries and the results have been pretty much the same.
His findings are that three per cent of the population are out and out entrepreneurs, 22 per cent of people can be assisted to be in business (franchisee’s), 15 per cent of people don’t actually know what they want, are termed the opportunists, and jump from opportunity to opportunity, while 60 per cent of the sample groups were employee centric.
Thus, given the business owner statistics, this will then be correct.
So trying to legislate people into business, who are no business people, will never achieve the goal of eradicating unemployment.
Identifying those who are the three per cent group and who are able to start and manage businesses should be the priority. They should be given all the assistance they need and they will go on to employ the nation, create jobs and create the people and the entities that pay tax.
I am sure the question would be how such percentage groups are formed – a suggestion has been that it has to do with how they were raised.
Should they have been raised in a household where business, stocks and shares were the topics of discussion around the dinner table, they more than likely would have developed into the three per cent group.
On the other hand, those who were raised to go to school, obtain good grades and a degree, well they were raised to be employees.
Of course this is not an exact science, and 60 per cent are found in their own businesses.
The Aerotropolis Chamber of Commerce contends that we need to identify as best we can our entrepreneurs, give them all the funding mentorship and support we can in starting there own businesses.
