Is the culture of ‘black tax' making it harder for young South Africans to save?
While government and the private sector continue to pour resources into educating South Africans about saving and managing debt, the reality is many consumers remain deep in debt and struggle to put money aside.
One factor often raised in the national conversation is the pressure of 'black tax', the financial support many young earners provide to their extended families.
For some this is a proud responsibility rooted in cultural duty. For others, it is a major obstacle to financial freedom.
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- The Citizen
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Daily Maverick
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It would have been much easier to overcome disagreements over the Budget, or the still-strange firing of the DA's Andrew Whitfield, if there had been another ultimate aim. But that is curiously lacking. And, strangely, it is not just the coalition. Direction unknown While there are many differing views about whether a National Dialogue would really be constructive, one of the most powerful arguments against it is that it will lack focus. It appears to include people from almost all parts of our public life. And their job is to discuss pretty much everything. This will probably be fatal to the process. It is hard to see what can really be achieved. Surely no decisions will be made that will alter the nature of our economy. Instead, it appears that many of our politicians, whether they are a part of the coalition, or supporting a dialogue, are more comfortable discussing issues other than the economy. There is a curious lack of focus. Of course, Operation Vulindlela and the progress it is making should not be ignored. Some of its measures, dealing with load shedding and the progress it's made at Transnet, are making slow changes to our economy that should be celebrated. But our politicians appear to lack the will to make the real changes that will matter. This is part of a pattern which took hold some time ago. Fifteen years ago, I made the same point about the ANC's lack of focus on the economy. At least eight years ago, ANC members made the same point on these pages. Government itself said back in 2020, even before the pandemic, that the economy was not going to grow unless there was action. This lack of focus obviously predates President Cyril Ramaphosa. Rather, it may be a feature of how the ANC has governed over the years. In 2007, days after winning the ANC leadership at Polokwane, Jacob Zuma gave very few clues on governance priorities. In 2009, the ANC said it had five 'apex priorities'. During the Zuma era in government, this lack of focus revealed itself in interesting ways. For example, in 2014 he appointed inter-ministerial committees to deal with particular issues. These committees were huge. The committee appointed to work against corruption (this was in the relatively early days of the Zuma era – the full irony of this committee would emerge later) included nine ministers. The committee on information and publicity had 12 (twelve!) members. It should be no surprise to anyone that nothing constructive was done here. Too many cooks There is, of course, a structural reason for all of this. As our society is so diverse, with so many different constituencies, politicians often struggle to be involved in discussions that will involve trade-offs. They do not want to be seen to be losing a single vote. The fact that the ANC set the tone for this may well be because it had the most diverse group of constituencies of all our parties. 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