EDITORIAL: Little to celebrate in jobless figures

There isn’t much to crow about in the latest quarterly labour force figures from Stats SA.

The unemployment rate edged down from 32.9% to 32.7% from the third to the fourth quarters of 2022. The economy has gained 1.6-million jobs since the depths of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 when it lost 2-million jobs, so we are still behind — and that is despite an unexpectedly strong bounce-back in the economy over the past two years.

Even more disturbing is the dramatic contrast between the number of adult South Africans who have jobs of any kind and those who depend on the state for income.

There are 15.9-million people in employment, according to Stats SA. There are also more than 26-million people on social grants, according to the Treasury. That includes more than 18-million people on old-age pensions, child support and disability grants, most of whom cannot work. But the rest are able-bodied adults on the social relief of distress grant who cannot earn an income from work.

This is not sustainable fiscally — and as things stand, the social relief of distress grant is due to end in March 2024. But it is also unsustainable for a society if so many adults, particularly young adults, cannot find work. It can only do deep damage to the social fabric and it is implicated in the endemic criminal activity that is eroding infrastructure and service delivery, as well as driving social unrest.  

The government’s priority should be to get those people into the ranks of employed people as quickly as possible. Instead, it is putting a Band-Aid on the problem with the presidential employment stimulus and other temporary measures. However worthwhile these might be, and however much they might do to improve young people’s chances of getting jobs — if there were any — they are no substitute for getting the economy to grow and create sustainable jobs.

With the economy expected to slow sharply this year and over the next few years, mainly because of Eskom and Transnet, SA’s unemployment disaster will surely get worse. Nor are the detailed breakdowns in the latest figures reassuring. It is unclear why domestic employment jumped so much in the fourth quarter or whether it is sustainable.

Nor is it clear why agricultural employment and informal sector employment declined. These are labour-intensive sectors that should be carefully watched and nurtured. Organised agriculture has rightly expressed disappointment at the latest figures and the government needs to work with the sector to turn the trend around.

Equally, the Western Cape provincial government’s delighted response to the strong jobs trend in that province is worth noting, given that the province has gained 330,000 jobs over the past year, an increase of almost 14%. It demonstrates that enabling and attracting investment, and taking steps to boost growth, do pay dividends in terms of job creation.

Higher growth will mean more jobs — if the government could just do what is so urgently needed to boost the economy.