(AsgiSA) Annual Report 2008 - South African Government Information

Accelerated and Shared Growth Initiative for South Africa
ANNUAL REPORT
2008
3.3.6 Urban inefficiencies constrain growth and place a cost burden on workers and the
poor
The high level of dependence on the core urban economy casts the spotlight on the
capacity of urban areas to support employment creation, access and opportunities at the
scale required. However, urban areas face a set of problems of their own.
Urban infrastructure is locked into the inefficient patterns created by apartheid – compounded
since then by implementation choices and land market logics that continue to house
poor people far away from economic opportunities, in poorly-planned, low-density housing
settlements that have high service costs, lack social-service infrastructure and do not facilitate
local economic activity. For example, the decision to supply only two-phase electricity
for lighting in many housing developments constrains the use of fridges, freezers, welding
or other equipment used by home-based enterprises, in a context in which in Gauteng, for
example, 69% of SMEs are home-based (Finscope Small Business Survey Report, 2006).
These new housing developments have not, however, managed to keep up with the influx
to urban areas, where ongoing growth in informal settlements and backyard shacks provide
the most visible manifestation of the “Second Economy” in urban areas – and where the
lack of basic services and tenure security further constrains the scope for local economic
dynamism.
3.3.7 Reliance on the wage mechanism to cover what are in fact wider social and economic
costs raises the costs of labour and disincentivises labour intensity
Many of the social and economic costs of the poor urban planning described above are carried
directly and indirectly by the poor, and impact on the costs of labour – through the high
cost of transport, as an example.
In addition, in the absence of forms of social protection targeting the unemployed (apart
from those eligible – for a limited period – to the Unemployment Insurance Fund), households
with unemployed members rely to a large extent on the wage income of those who
are employed; as well as on the contribution of social grants actually intended to target
other needs. This in turn dilutes the impact of these grants on the needs they are intended
to address – such as child support.
This level of reliance on the wage mechanism to cover wider social and economic costs –
rather than using the social wage to do so – strengthens wage pressures and impacts on
labour costs and the costs of production in general – strengthening existing biases against
labour-intensive production.
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