SARS has published its annual tax statistics, showing the breakdown of South African taxpayers, and which salary ranges they fall under.<\/p>\n
The overall data showed that revenue from personal income tax (PIT), as a percentage of total tax revenue, increased from 29.6% in 2007\/08 to 37.2% in 2016\/17 with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 10.8%, and a proportion of 8.4% of GDP over this period.<\/p>\n
Tax revenue collected amounted to R1.144 trillion, growing year-on-year by R74.1 billion (6.9%) mainly supported by PIT which grew by R36.6 billion (9.4%), SARS said.<\/p>\n
Tax revenue basically doubled in 10 years, increasing from R572.8 billion in 2007\/08 to R1.144 trillion in 2016\/17, growing by R571.3 billion. This is a CAGR of 8.0% for the nine-year period prior to 2016\/17.<\/p>\n
What taxpayers are earning<\/strong><\/p>\n According to SARS’ data, there are 148,266 millionaires in South Africa, the bulk of which are earners in the R1 million to R2 million per annum salary range.<\/p>\n There were over 7,000 more millionaires in the country compared to 2015\/16, where there were 141,197 millionaires recorded.<\/p>\n All millionaires had a total taxable income of R287.24 billion – at an average of R1.94 million.<\/p>\n While there were more millionaires in 2016\/17 than the prior year, the number of millionaires in the R5 million-plus range was down from 5,752 people in 2015\/16 (a loss of 125 individuals).<\/p>\n Overall, 4.8 million people paid income tax in 2016\/17, with the total taxable income of R1.441 trillion (R300,398 per person).<\/p>\n The largest tax pool was for those earning between R250,000 and R350,000 a year (825,000 people). The vast majority of taxpayers – over 3 million people – earn under R350,000, the data showed.<\/p>\n\n
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