Minimum wage kills jobs
WE ALL know that a minimum wage across the spectrum kills jobs because it is plain logic that not every company can afford what central bargaining decides.
We have been through this cycle plenty of times from the 1980s when many of our parents lost jobs thanks to Cosatu and calls for disinvestment.
I believe that every street in SA has a mother or father who lost a job in the 1980s.
We saw former homeland companies fall when workers demanded irresponsibly high salary scales.
The Cosatu and ANC lot said warnings by fellow non-ANC blacks came from stooges who didn ’ t have the best interests of blacks at heart.
One wonders if they are proud to have created a 26.5% unem- ployment rate during their tenure.
Most of us grew up struggling. We are still struggling because we do not have connections in the ANC.
To hear people wanting to defend this minimum wage call and the central bargaining of Cosatu makes one wonder about people ’ s wisdom or perhaps the social- ists ’ extent of cruelty.
A great example not long ago was when minimum wages were enforced for domestic workers. Many black South Africans lost their jobs because not every household could afford the minimum.
It ’ s not as though every white person is a billionaire. We have deliberately turned a blind eye to the slave wages paid by black households or by employers who could afford to pay better.
Eventually the same Cosatu and ANC opened our borders and allowed black neighbours to take the same jobs that pay below the minimum wage. Again black South Africans lost but still they opted to support the alliance.
For a long time one wondered why authentic, self-made black entrepreneurs cowered instead of challenging the ANC and Cosatu.
Help save South Africa from socialists hellbent on destroying anything in their bid to establish their ideology. They do not care how many people starve in their quest to delegitimise capitalism. May all genuine self-made black entrepreneurs speak the truth and save SA.
Bongani Miya, by e-mail