Thousands more South Africans are unemployed, negating job gains from a year ago

After some job gains between March and December last year, the official unemployment rate – which doesn’t include discouraged work seekers – is back to where it was a year ago, at 32.9%.

However, this is off the record high of 35.3% seen in the fourth quarter of 2021 in the direct aftermath of COVID-19. South Africa saw record low unemployment rate of 21.50% in the fourth quarter of 2008, according to Trading Economics data.

The official unemployment rate moved upwards because 291 000 people lost their jobs quarter-on-quarter, dropping the employed workforce to 16.8 million as of March this year, Statistics South Africa said on Tuesday.

At the same time, there was an increase of 1.3 percentage points of people entering the workforce, or 532 000 more working-age South Africans, which resulted in there also being more unemployed people. That figure is now 8.2 million.

The agency specifically noted that those aged between 15 and 34 years are still the most vulnerable when it comes to the job market, with both work losses and an increase in unemployed youngsters pushing that unemployment rate up to 46.1% from 44.6% quarter-on-quarter.

There were also more discouraged work seekers while the number of those who are not economically active for other reasons gained 1.4%.

Overall, the changes in the number of people with jobs moved 1 percentage point higher quarter-on-quarter to 32.9%, with the overall unemployment rate, which includes discouraged job seekers, went from 41.9% to 43.1%.

The statistical agency’s figures show that the job losses were driven by the formal sector, with industries such as trade and construction driving the job loss trend. On the flip side, transport and finance saw net job gains.

Increases in employment were observed in Western Cape, Gauteng and the Free State, while declines in the number of those employed were seen in KwaZulu-Natal, the Eastern Cape and the North West provinces.

IOL