Angry, jobless youth are a ticking time bomb

There are many sobering figures in a new research report by the Centre for Enterprise and Development (CDE) about unemployment. But none highlights the dire situation as effectively as the statistic that, despite more than 500 young people joining the labour force every day since 2008, more than 100 young people lost their jobs daily.

In a country where, according to the CDE’s Ann Bernstein, the reality is that only four out of ten adults are employed, the only conclusion is that we are sitting on a time bomb – not just economically, but socially, too.

Unemployment is most acute in the 18 to 34 age group and those young people are already angry. Many of them are prominent in service delivery protests. Unemployment drives poverty, which in turn breeds helplessness and that anger where violence is seen as an end in itself for those who have nothing left to lose.

The ANC has repeatedly made hollow promises about job creation, yet its own policies and light-fingered cadre-looters mean there is little state money left to subsidise employment schemes. Anti-investment and anti-business policies also deter the investment needed to create job opportunities.

It is very difficult to see a way out of the morass.

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