Jobs bloodbath report: only 42% of adults are employed

Only four out of 10 adults in South Africa are employed and job opportunities for young people look bleak, according to a new research report by the Centre for Development and Enterprise (CDE) titled Ten Million and Rising, what it would take to address South Africa’s jobs bloodbath.

The report argues that the crisis of unemployment, which it describes as the deepest in the world, has worsened because government has failed to address its underlying causes, which is largely due to slow economic growth.

The report is based on considerable research over the past five years, round-table discussions with SA’s leading experts on growth and jobs, and a number of publications on these issues.

According to the CDE’s executive director, Ann Bernstein, the situation for young people (aged 15 to 34) is even worse.

She said that between 2008 and 2019, the population of young people increased by 2.2 million but the number employed fell by more than 500,000. This means that despite more than 500 additional young people joining the workforce daily since 2008, more than 100 young people lost their jobs daily.

“The problem has been exacerbated by years of neglect and inappropriate policies – but all is not lost,” said Bernstein. “We could make significant progress in stimulating growth and increasing employment if government were to adopt a package of realistic policies.”

Avoiding essential reforms while focusing attention on ad hoc projects, or special initiatives, was not the answer.

“Instead, the focus should be on SA’s key task: designing, implementing and successfully managing a policy reform process. We have to grasp the depth and scale of the crisis, be honest about the causes and act with urgency to implement the necessary reforms,” she said.

Economist Chris Hart said to get out of the red zone and decrease the unemployment rate, SA needed to up its investment drive to attract investors and create jobs.

Hart said judging by the current state of affairs, the economy was not well placed to attract investors because of the high levels of corruption and distrust.

“First, we need to get a growth rate of between 3% to 5% to start eating into the unemployment rate. Then, we need to get our investment in order because you cannot build new economic activity without investments.”

Considering the recent downgrade of the country’s growth outlook to 0.9% by the World Bank, these numbers seem a tall order.

Hart said even though a lot of investors had lost faith in South Africa due to corruption, there was still hope that the country could restore investor confidence.

Political analyst Daniel Silke said the report was a true reflection of failed government policies over the past two decades.

“We simply cannot continue doing what we have been doing before, therefore we need radical restructuring of our policies that can drive economic growth,” said Silke.

One of the key findings of the report was only 42% of adults were employed, which is a decrease from 46% in 2008. Globally, 61% of adults are working.

Since 2008, SA’s working population has increased by seven million people, but fewer than two million of those work.

– gcinan@ citizen.co.za

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