What the new Living Wage really means to low earning South Africans

Recently, Professor Ines Meyer from the University of Cape Town announced a monthly income of R15,000 net as the Living Wage figure for 2024 to the Living Wage South Africa Network (LWSAN). The amount is calculated against the self-reported quality of life of low-earning survey participants across South Africa.

In the public, this amount was met with mixed reception “A number of people insisted that R15,000 could never cover their monthly obligations,” says Ines Meyer, who is also the current chairperson of the LWSAN. She understands this sentiment. “It is hard to make ends meet on R15,000, yet most who work in South Africa earn even less. The legally prescribed national minimum wage comes to only one third of the Living Wage. If it is difficult to live on R15,000 per month how shall those whose income is even lower get by?”.

”The Living Wage South Africa Network encourages the public and employers to consider the plight of these earners who struggle to afford the bare essentials the rest of us take for granted,” she says.

What is the Living Wage?

The Living Wage is remuneration that is sufficient for the country’s lowest earning workers to provide for their families, with enough left over for savings to cover unforeseen emergencies.

“This affords the opportunity to live a ‘decent’ life in the sense that it gives people a choice over areas of life that matter to them,” says Meyer.

Employers are encouraged to pay the Living Wage voluntarily, as an act of human decency.

“We complain about living month-to-month but many low-earning families survive from morning-to-morning,” says Meyer.

Even relief programmes, like basic free electricity, are restricted and require an applicant to be identified as an indigent. “So, you’d have to remain in poverty just to qualify for them,” says Meyer.

It’s not hard to see what a tremendous difference R15,000 could make to their existence and their dignity as humans.

Unfortunately, employers continue to measure a worker’s worth by the value their labour offers the company based on job gradings and benchmarks, not their inherent value as living beings.

“This thinking developed almost a century ago when the world looked very different to today. We sincerely need to question this outdated thinking and create a cultural threshold where compassion for our fellow human aligns with corporate ambition,” says Meyer. Paying individuals at the bottom end of the income spectrum a living wage indicates that we value them. Contrary to popular belief, this increased wage bill often leads to improved, rather than diminished, financial performance for companies.