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Number of unemployed people rose to a record high of 8.38m in second quarter of 2024

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Stats SABL Premium writes that SA’s economy is not creating jobs fast enough to absorb all the people entering the job market, which has led to the number of job seekers unable to find work rising to a new high of 8.38-million people.

Despite the recovery in the labour market after the impact of Covid, the economy has failed to keep pace with growth in the population over an extended period, Stanlib chief economist Kevin Lings pointed out. Stats SA announced on Tuesday in its the Quarterly Labour Force Survey (QLFS) a decrease of 92,000 in the number of employed people to 16.7-million in the second quarter. The unemployment rate advanced to 33.5% in the three months through June compared with 32.9% in the previous quarter. This was the highest level since 2022. Under the expanded definition of the unemployment rate, which counts not only those seeking work but those too discouraged to look for a job, there was an increase of 0.7 percentage points to 42.6% in the second quarter. People aged 15-24 years and 25-34 continued to have the highest unemployment rates at 60.8% and 41.7% respectively. The largest number of job losses was in the trade sector, which shed 111,000 jobs during the quarter. That was followed by 45,000 fewer jobs in agriculture, 18,000 in private households, 11,000 in construction and 9,000 in finance. The manufacturing sector added 49,000 jobs over the period. The Western Cape, Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal recorded the largest employment decreases. Gauteng saw the largest increase.

  • Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Denene Erasmus at BusinessLive (subscriber access only)
  • Read too, SA unemployment rate rises to two-year high, at Moneyweb


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