Business Insider SA writes that last week Statistics SA (Stats SA) released a set of horrific unemployment numbers for the third quarter, reporting that 6.5 million people were jobless and that the unemployment rate had jumped to a record 30.8%.  

Under the expanded definition of unemployment, the jobless rate reached 43.1%.  But the numbers came with big caveats.  Only 18,021 households were surveyed to determine the employment status for the total adult population.  Given that there are between 17 million to 20 million households in the country, less than 0.11% of SA’s households were contacted to confirm their employment situation.  Usually, Stats SA contacts some 30,000 households through in-person interviews, but it suspended face-to-face data collection in March due to the pandemic and switched to “computer-assisted telephone interviewing”.  “Given the change in the survey mode of collection and the fact that Q3: 2020 estimates are not based on a full sample, comparisons with previous quarters should be made with caution,” Stats SA warned.  As a result, the unemployment data for the past two quarters were not reliable enough to take seriously, said Old Mutual’s Johann Els.  Only after collection methods have normalised for some months, would the labour data start to be reliable enough to show the real impact of the pandemic on the labour market, which might only be in a year’s time, Els indicated.  But whether or not the data is accurate to the percentage point, the larger crisis is clear that SA has a massive unemployment problem.

• Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Helena Wasserman at Business Insider SA
• Read too, Lockdown relaxation ‘far too late’ to save jobs, on page 4 of The Citizen of 13 November 2020
• And also, Latest unemployment statistics paint grim picture, on page 15 of Sunday Independent Business Report of 15 November 2020

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