By Paul Vecchiatto
The South African economy is characterised by "insiders” and "outsiders” and this has been confirmed by the World Bank report released on Tuesday‚ says Democratic Alliance (DA) finance spokesperson Tim Harris.
Reacting to the World Bank report‚ Harris said on Wednesday(25/07/2012) that bridging this divide was at the heart of his party’s "Plan for Growth and Jobs”‚ to be launched at the weekend in Freedom Park‚ Pretoria.
"SA is one of the most unequal countries in the world. According to the World Bank report‚ the top 10% of the population accounted for 58% of SA’s income‚ whilst the bottom 10% accounted for just 0.5% of income‚” he said.
He said income inequality in SA was defined by the gap between those that had work and those that did not.
"This means that any intervention to tackle inequality should be measured by its ability to create jobs. The World Bank identifies that at the heart of (SA’s) high inequality lies the inability to create employment opportunities on a large enough scale‚” he said.
Harris said that with unemployment sitting at 36.6% (this is higher than the official rate of just above 25%) and youth unemployment at roughly 60%‚ the country was in desperate need of a new‚ coherent economic plan to deliver it from the current crisis. - I-Net Bridge
