Only the privileged see the minimum wage as a living wage

South Africa has a humiliating kind of poverty. At the dawn of democracy, aspirations were no longer limited by race or gender.

Fast forward to the here and now, shack dwellers and estate residents to a certain extent now live side by side.

Estate residents are upset by the depreciating influence the shacks have on their properties while shack residents watch the kind of the life they hope and pray for recede.

Alexandra and Sandton are built side by side and the estates of Ballito are built on the brink of Shakaskraal informal settlement.

In Sandton, one takes in the sunset with a glass of sherry while the residents of Alexandra choke on the smokey air as they prepare evening meals after a long day working in Sandton, the suburb they look across at.

Sandton lawns are manicured and well hydrated, the swimming pools have sparkling blue water and children lap up the joys of youth.

But across the highway lawns are too expensive, water is stored in buckets and children give up their youth as their parents sweat it out in wealthy areas.

While Natalie’s mother drops her off in the latest SUV, your mother, the cleaning lady, walks into the school with you.

Phumzile has to constantly do more and be more just to be accepted. The effects of inequality will be felt by Phumzile and Sipho growing up in Alex.

Phumzile is likely to look for a man to take her out of poverty, exposing herself to sugar daddies and local thugs who represent power in that community.

She may become another teenage pregnancy statistic and drop out of school to look after children she is left to raise on an entry-level income.

Sipho, on the other hand, may be a young man with an old face, ravaged by street drugs. He could be terrorising the townships or the country with crime, he could be the father of many children abandoned as fast as he conceived them.

Both Phumzile and Sipho are the products of a society. They were raised by a Phumzile and a Sipho.

The cycle continues, and we see this in the minimum wage, which is so often confused with a living wage by the privileged.