Publication: South Africa Economic Update, Edition 13: Building Back Better from COVID-19 with a Special Focus on Jobs
Date
2021-06
ISSN
Published
2021-06
Author(s)
World Bank
Abstract
South Africa is set
to emerge from the crisis weaker than it had been going into it. However,
this Economic Update argues that the reasons for low growth and
high unemployment do not lie in the government’s crisis response,
which has generally been sound. Growth is expected to reach 4 percent
in 2021, slowing to 2.1 percent in 2022 and 1.5 by 2023. The global
recovery is helping South Africa, especially given strong performance
by China and the United States, two of its main trading partners. With
deeper economic reforms, South Africa could benefit even more from
the high growth in its trading partners. Low-wage workers suffered almost four times
more job losses than did high-wage ones. Although a modest job recovery
has started, it is at risk from the severe third wave of the pandemic. Self-employment represents only 10 percent of all jobs,
as against 30 percent in most upper-middle-income economies, such
as Turkey, Mexico, and Brazil. The emerging start-up sector in South
Africa could help close this gap.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2021. South Africa Economic Update, Edition 13: Building Back Better from COVID-19 with a Special Focus on Jobs. © World Bank, Washington, DC. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/35987 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”