South Africa lost over 160,000 jobs in the past year, led by a massive drain in the community services industry, amid tough economic conditions in the country.<\/p>\n
This is according to the Quarterly Employment Statistics<\/a> from Stats SA, which tracks data from March 2015 to June 2015, as well as year-on-year from June 2014.<\/p>\n In the last quarter, there was a net loss of 1,000 jobs in the country. This was due to decreases in the following industries:<\/p>\n The job losses were somewhat offset by job increases in these industries:<\/p>\n The mining and quarrying industry and electricity industry remained unchanged, StatsSA said.<\/p>\n Comparing year-on-year data, South Africa now has 161,000 fewer employed people in the formal, non-agricultural sector.<\/p>\n This represents just over 80% of total formal employment and 60% of total jobs in SA.<\/p>\n The community services industry, which employs over 2.5 million people, was the biggest casualty, having shed over 141,000 jobs in the last year.<\/p>\n As at June 2015, 8.945 million people were employed in the sector, versus 8.944 million in 2014.<\/p>\n The stats paint a dismal picture for South African employment, as the formal sector is one of the largest job markets in the country.<\/p>\n This means that massive job losses are a sign that the country’s stubbornly high unemployment rate is likely to persist.<\/p>\n South Africa has an unemployment rate above 25% by the narrow definition of unemployment – shooting up to about 34% when taking the broad definition into account.<\/p>\n Worse still, more than 50% of working-age youth (between 15-24 years) are unemployed.<\/p>\n According to FNB economists Jason Muscat and Alex Smith, the lack of formal sector job gains will likely keep the labour market under significant pressure over the medium term.<\/p>\n A way to combat South Africa\u2019s youth unemployment crisis<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n White vs black unemployment in South Africa<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n South Africa unemployment is worse now than at the end of apartheid<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n
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SA job crisis<\/h3>\n
More on unemployment<\/h3>\n