R1.5 billion for 712 employees: A breakdown of how much SA public servants earn

Public Service and Administration Minister Ayanda Dlodlo recently responded to a written parliamentary question and provided a breakdown of how much government employees earn.

Democratic Alliance (DA) MP Leon Schreiber had requested a detailed breakdown of the current salaries of government employees.

He also queried the total amount due to be spent annually on paying public servant salaries, as well as a breakdown of the total numbers of government employees.

Government salaries

Salary levels

According to Dlodlo, there are 16 salary levels (SLs).

Employees on level one earn R103,562 per year (R8,630 per month), while employees on level 16 earn a whopping R2,130,602 per year (R177,550 per month).

While only 263 employees fall under SL1 – and 712 under SL16 – the majority are classified as SL5 (201,244 employees), SL6 (129,361), SL7 (306,703), SL8 (159,899), and SL9 (99,927).

Top tier versus the average citizen

Here’s where it gets interesting, though. Government spends R1,516,988,624.00 per annum, just on the 712 employees in SL16 alone.

Yes, that is R1.5 billion.

On one salary tier.

Meanwhile, according to Stats SA, the average monthly salary for an ordinary South African is R23,122 per month as of February 2021, practically unchanged from the R23,119 in November 2020

Salary Level	Number of employees	Monthly salary	Total per annum
SL1	263	103,562.00	27,236,806.00
SL2	77651	171,278.00	13,299,907,978.00
SL3	69003	206,957.00	14,280,653,871.00
SL4	38663	247,296.00	9,561,205,248.00
SL5	201244	283,227.00	56,997,734,388.00
SL6	129361	332,985.00	43,075,272,585.00
SL7	306703	411,227.00	126,124,554,581.00
SL8	159899	479,868.00	76,730,413,332.00
SL9	99927	567,956.00	56,754,139,212.00
SL10	54510	710,273.00	38,716,981,230.00
SL11	35365	851,022.00	30,096,393,030.00
SL12	27399	1,222,246.00	33,488,318,154.00
SL13	7660	1,147,609.00	8,790,684,940.00
SL14	2405	1,378,620.00	3,315,581,100.00
SL15	528	1,661,168.00	877,096,704.00
SL16	712	2,130,602.00	1,516,988,624.00
	1211293		R513,653,161,783.00

But wait; there’s more. The figures provided by Dlodlo also show that 27,423 employees are classified as “Other” and do not fall under any of the salary tiers.

The estimated total cost of employment for these employees add up to a staggering R12,097,656,000 (R12 billion)

Wage agreements

In response to Schreiber’s question about the total amount to be spent annually in terms of the latest public service wage agreement, Dlodlo provided the figures below:

Salary level	Total cost of implementing Resolution 1 of 2021
SL1	R9 552 000
SL2	R1 235 509 000
SL3	R1 146 359 000
SL4	R619 649 000
SL5	R3 382 164 000
SL6	R2 457 016 000
SL7	R5 854 878 000
SL8	R3 434 624 000
SL9	R2 261 454 000
SL10	R1 416 912 000
SL11	R989 621 000
SL12	R888 732 000
SL13	N/A
SL14	N/A
SL15	N/A
SL16	N/A
Total	R23,696,470.000

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