Sundaymail EditorSouth Africa should impose compulsory levies on companies and workers to create and capitalise a public social welfare fund, the Department of Social Development proposed.
All employers and workers should contribute as much as 12 percent of their earnings to set up a fund that could provide unemployment, retirement and disability benefits, the department said in a so-called green paper on social security and retirement reform. Levies should be mandatory for those earning at least R276 004 (US$18 190) a year, the current ceiling for unemployment insurance contributions, and the government should subsidise low-income workers’ dues, the department said.
While elements of the proposal date back more than a decade, riots that erupted last month and claimed 354 lives have reinvigorated those calling for the state to increase support for the vulnerable. South Africa is one of the world’s most unequal nations, a legacy of the apartheid system that disadvantaged the black majority and ended in 1994. — Bloomberg
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