2 days ago
Stats SA decries suggestions unemployment rate overstated after data questioned
JOHANNESBURG - Statistics South Africa (Stats SA) has pushed back on suggestions that the country's unemployment rate is overstated after its data was called into question.
Capitec Bank CEO Gerrie Fourie sparked debate this week when he called for unemployment figures to be revised, claiming that informal traders in townships or villages were being misclassified or ignored by Stats SA.
Fourie believes the official unemployment rate is closer to 10% and not the current reading of 32.9% reported by Stats SA in the first quarter figures.
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Statistician-General Risenga Maluleke said the informal economy was not being ignored.
He said this sector was accounted for in the Quarterly Labour Force Survey and the Survey of Employers and Self-Employed.
Maluleke believes the data by the agency is beyond reproach.
"I have no reason whatsoever to believe that members of the public are misleading us in relation to their employment status.
"This data we are collecting has been showing consistency over time in terms of how employment occurs. Otherwise, at some stage, we would have picked it up."
South Africa's unemployment rate is among the highest in the world, something Stats SA said needed the intervention of government, business, civil society.
