A quarter of participants in a new survey by Stats SA have seen their incomes reduced during the nationwide lockdown, which is now into its eighth week.
The near total halt to business activity, bar essential services, which was instituted to slow the spread of the coronavirus, is expected to see the economy shrink by anywhere between 5.4% and 16.7% in 2020. For those who lost earnings, the majority, or almost 75%, said they had cut down on spending to cope, while just over half have also accessed their savings, including money stored in stokvels.members while 14.6% had claimed from the unemployment insurance fund .
When it came to employment, almost nine in 10 of the respondents who were employed before the national lockdown remained in employment during the lockdown — though 8.1% reported losing their jobs or having to close their businesses and a further 1.4% “became unemployed”.