An Employment-Targeted Economic Program for South Africa

The people of South Africa, and the African National Congress-led government, have made extraordinary social and economic advances since ending apartheid and beginning the transition to democracy in 1994. But the country still faces severe problems of mass unemployment, underemployment and poverty. This new study by PERI researchers Robert Pollin, Gerald Epstein, James Heintz and Leonce Ndikumana, commissioned by the United Nations Development Program, presents a detailed economic program designed to produce major reductions in unemployment and poverty, and a general spreading of economic well-being; and to achieve these ends in a manner that is sustainable over a longer-term framework.

“This United Nations-commissioned study presents the work of a group of leading economists who were asked to think about the nature of the economic policy agenda that South Africa should be pursuing after a decade that was punctuated by improved levels of growth and a growing black middle class, but increased levels of poverty and structural unemployment. This is an exciting and stimulating work, and one that will leave its mark upon the work of social scientists and policy makers.”
—Lumkile Mondi, Chief Economist and Executive Vice President, Industrial Development Corporation of South Africa; and Member, Presidential Economic Advisory Panel of South Africa