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Unemployment: White citizens least affected while black youth have no prospects
White South Africans are still the least affected – recording an unemployment rate of only 10%.
Black South Africans are the worst affected, with an unemployment rate of 38.6%. Photo: iStock
Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) released its Quarterly Labour Force Survey report for 2022’s first quarter, showing a slight decrease in the official unemployment rate.
Even though it showed an improvement for the first time in two years, a whopping 11.7 million people are still without any job prospects.
Despite this, the Eastern Cape, Mpumalanga and Limpopo recorded expanded unemployment rates well above 50%.
Unemployment rate
By province
Eastern Cape has the highest official unemployment rate in the country (44%), which is one percentage point down from the previous quarter, and a 0.2% year-on-year change.
Second on the list of worst affected provinces is the Free State with an unemployment rate of 35.6%, followed by Gauteng with 34.4%.
The largest decreases, however, were reported in the Free State (down by 5.6 percentage points) as well as the North West (down by 3.7 percentage points), and the Western Cape (down by 2.8 percentage points).
Meanwhile, Limpopo recorded the largest increase in joblessness with a spike of 1.7 percentage points.
The Eastern Cape, Limpopo and the North West province all show an expanded unemployment rate of more than 50%:
- The Eastern Cape (54.5%);
- Limpopo (54.5%);
- The North West (52.2%)
No hope for SA youth
South African youth are discouraged by the current state of affairs and have given up on building their skills base through education and training.
StatsSA’s findings show they are “not in employment, education or training (NEET)”.
Out of South Africa’s 10.2 million people aged 15 to 24 years, 37% were unemployed and/or not receiving training, which is 4.6 percentage points higher than 2021’s first quarter.
In addition, women in this age group experienced higher levels of unemployment than men.
“The NEET rate for males and females increased by 5.9 percentage points and 3.3 percentage points, respectively. The NEET rate for females was higher than that of their male counterparts in both years,” as per StatsSA’s report.
Overall, South Africans between the ages of 15 and 24 showed an unemployment rate of 63.6%, which is considerably higher than the other age groups:
- 25 to 34 years: 42.1%
- 35 to 44 years: 29.4%
- 45 to 54 years: 21.8%
- 55 to 64 years: 12.2%
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By population group
While the national unemployment rate is 34.5% for the first quarter, black South Africans are the worst affected, with an unemployment rate of 38.6% – 4.1% above the national average.
Meanwhile, unemployment in the coloured community has been recorded as 25.9% (3.9 percentage points down from the previous quarter).
The Indian/Asian population group recorded an unemployment rate of 17.1%, which is 10.4 percentage points down from the previous quarter.
White South Africans are still the least affected – recording an unemployment rate of only 10%, which is 1.2 percentage points up from the previous quarter.
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