SA's economy is unlikely to grow and create jobs without more investment - yet in a week in which official statistics showed the unemployment rate reaching a record high, updated economic data also showed that SA's private investment rate has fallen to its lowest level in at least four decades.Fewer than 38 out of every 100 South Africans of working age actually had a job in the second quarter of this year, Stats SA reported. The unemployment rate rose to an unprecedented 34.4% as the economy reverted to shedding jobs in the formal sector, following gains in the previous three quarters as the economy bounced back from last year's hard lockdown.At the same time, revisions to the GDP statistics found that gross fixed capital formation - which measures investment spending on infrastructure and fixed assets such as new factories, mines or malls - has proved to be lower than earlier estimated, falling by two percentage points to just 14% of GDP at the end of 2020, at which level it is ...
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