{"id":268713,"date":"2018-09-02T13:00:32","date_gmt":"2018-09-02T11:00:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=268713"},"modified":"2018-08-31T15:41:48","modified_gmt":"2018-08-31T13:41:48","slug":"heres-how-much-poorer-south-africans-are-right-now-compared-to-10-years-ago","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/finance\/268713\/heres-how-much-poorer-south-africans-are-right-now-compared-to-10-years-ago\/","title":{"rendered":"Here&#8217;s how much poorer South Africans are right now compared to 10 years ago"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>BankservAfrica\u2019s latest take-home pay index revealed that South African salaries increased by 2.2% year on year as at June 2018.<\/p>\n<p>However, inflation grew by 4.6% effectively resulting in a year on year salary decline 2.4%.<\/p>\n<p>When comparing the rate at which average salaries for white-collar workers have increased in the last decade, it can be determined that South Africans are in fact getting poorer, even though their salaries are technically increasing.<\/p>\n<p>This is according to Broll&#8217;s latest <strong><a href=\"https:\/\/www.broll.com\/news\/broll-retail-snapshot-highlights-consumer-pressure-with-innovation-as-the-upside\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">retail<\/a> <\/strong>report which examined how the prices of key products and services have increased over the past 10 years as well as year-on-year in 2018, and the effect this has on the spending power of the average South African.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;An exercise was undertaken whereby the average salaries for lawyers, administrative assistants, engineers, accountants, personal assistants and teachers from 2008 to 2018 were investigated,&#8221; Broll said.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;It was found that real salaries rose at an average of 4.9% per annum over this period. However, when adjusted for inflation it turns out that salaries should have grown by 6.7% per annum for people to be earning the equivalent of what they did in 2008.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Thus when comparing 2018 real vs adjusted for-inflation salaries, people are in fact 10.6% poorer than they were in 2008,&#8221; it said.<\/p>\n<p><a  data-lightbox=\"post-image\" href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Broll-1.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-268731 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Broll-1.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"476\" height=\"416\" srcset=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Broll-1.jpg 476w, https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Broll-1-300x262.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 476px) 100vw, 476px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><strong>Factors affecting consumer spend<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>As part of the report, Broll looked at a number of which factors were to blame for the decline in consumer spending.<\/p>\n<p>It also offered a comparison of 12 everyday items, and how much they cost in 2008 vs 2018.<\/p>\n<p>These include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>VAT hike &#8211;\u00a0Consumer spending has been set back even further with the 1% increase in VAT effective 1 April, a 52 cents increase in the fuel levy and sin taxes up between 6% and 10% depending on the product, the report notes.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Electricity &#8211;\u00a0South Africa\u2019s electricity cost is in the higher bracket compared with 95 countries across the globe with citizens paying R2.05\/kWh compared to the world average of R1.51\/kWh. The high cost of electricity hangs on Eskom\u2019s supply shortages and thus prices have increased more than 350% in the past decade, a trend that is unlikely to reverse.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Property &#8211;\u00a0The annual increase in municipal rates, taxes and services costs, as well as the re-valuation of properties also increase the financial burden of consumers, it said.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Petrol &#8211;\u00a0The petrol price, although competitive on a global scale, saw a July increase that set a new record hitting R16.02\/litre for 95 unleaded. When compared to prices in 2008, petrol now costs 49.7% more. This not only impacts the cost of transport but has spin-off costs in all related industries and particularly food, it said.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Groceries &#8211;\u00a0Broll added that the cost of basic goods such as milk, meat, sugar, bread and cheese was much cheaper 10 years ago with a basket of goods in 2018 costing 93.4 % more.\u00a0 White bread costs R13.49 today, but cost only R5,89 in 2008.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Sin taxes &#8211;\u00a0 Cigarettes now also cost more than double at R45.35 (for a 20-pack) compared to R20.13 in 2008 while 250g of instant coffee now takes R36.99 out of your pocket, but only cost R13,80 in 2008.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<ul>\n<li>Entertainment &#8211;\u00a0Going to the movies is quite an expensive outing, the report indicates, with the cost of a 2D movie ticket about R85, costing closer to R25, 10 years ago.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<hr \/>\n<p><strong>Read: <a href=\"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/finance\/268209\/these-are-the-south-africans-who-could-have-their-debt-written-off-under-the-changed-credit-bill\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">These are the South Africans who could have their debt written off under the changed credit bill<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A new report examines how spending power in South Africa has dropped, as salary increases have failed to match the rate of inflation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":144519,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11121],"tags":[13319,26],"class_list":["post-268713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance","tag-broll","tag-headline"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=268713"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268713\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":268787,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/268713\/revisions\/268787"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/144519"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=268713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=268713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=268713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}