South Africa is known as the "Rainbow Nation" except this rainbow does not have a pot of gold at either end.
A shocking statistic for any country having over 62% of their youth unemployed because it offers little to no hope for any type of future earning prospects. Youth is somewhat misleading because this age group is 15 -34 year old people and 34 is an adult in my book.
The worrying part is we do not know how accurate this statistic really is as this has been hovering around 62% for well over 2 years now. Looking at the official government stats which we are know not accurate they have risen from 36.9% to 46.1% which is a 9.2% increase for Q1 2025.
South Africa has a reported working age population of 42 million people with this age group 15-34 representing half that figure so there is either 10 million or 12 million people unemployed. I would have thought youth would be 16-24 and it is like the government is bundling these figures to make things sound better than it actually is. These people realistically have very little prospects of finding employment any time soon and is reliant on the government grant hand outs which are worth a pittance being R350 or $18 monthly.
One wonders all the time how long this can continue before we have total anarchy as uprisings do happen and it normally comes from the young generation. The problem is these numbers form a huge part of the population and these numbers are steadily rising which is unsustainable and a powder keg ready to explode.
In times of economic hardships most people would not be thinking of having kids yet Africa must be booming compared to the rest of the world. We know this is not the case and this is down to education or lack there of.
If only the SA Government would actually be concerned for their people and not
more concerned about themselves. Thee economy needs stimulus and all I see is discussions of having to raise income tax on the few that are working to fund those not working. I mentioned this previously that only a small percentage are paying for everyone and that percentage is in single digits.
This week Goodyear tyres who have a manufacturing plant that has been operating for 80 years is closing it's doors. The result of cheaper imports impacting the economy creating job losses. Companies are being left to fend for themselves with no government protection and now having 1000 jobs at risk. The local unions say they are dismayed yet this is not rocket science and inevitable. This is easy to see why the unemployment trend is still climbing and until there is a change in policy this is only going to become worse.
Last year in 2024 Johannesburg had more than 10 000 businesses close their doors and these were not replaced. Thee economy is shrinking and with that any hope of employment is also disappearing fast. For those that are lucky enough to have a job they must hope and pray they are not next on the chopping block. At some stage you will end up with very few companies which will be overstretched paying an ever increasing tax bill which will place even more strain on those trying to stay operational. This one can see will never end well and is like a death spiral in slow motion. SA needs a miracle to happen to get out of this mess.