Readers’Views

Pay tolls now, or pay later with crumbling roads and snarled traffic

It is time people realised that in the absence of a sound rail system good roads are essential to the economic health of a country or region.

The Gauteng Freeway Improvement Project with payment by e-tolling was designed to strengthen the economic health of Gauteng.

Roads are not cheap to build, and now that public agitation has brought about this hiatus, the only people who will suffer are the citizens of Gauteng.

Either they somehow find the billions of rands that will be necessary to maintain and regularly upgrade the Gauteng freeway system or they suffer the fate of a crumbling network and terrible traffic congestion in the future.

South Africa is not awash with public funds, so where, other than future tolling, will the money be found? — Malcolm Mitchell, on BusinessLIVE

Public sector wages sink the ship

Research shows South Africa is hugely overpaying its public sector workers compared to peer countries.

It is so lucrative to be in government that people prefer to be unemployed for years, hoping to “get in” rather than start their own businesses.

The government is running out of money ... everybody knows the high wage bill is unsustainable and will lead to large job cuts in the public sector sooner or later.

If wage growth is moderated, more people will keep their jobs. It’s about everyone chipping in to save the ship

— not something we’re good at in South Africa, nê? — Mani None, on BusinessLIVE

Are grocers now bankers?

Pick n Pay’s announcement that it will accept payment with Bitcoin refers.

The grocer seems to be taking on the role of banker.

Whereas previously one would draw cash from a bank teller, increasingly one is forced to obtain cash from the supermarket cashier, or to request that they provide change for the larger denominations spat out by ATMs.

Why should a grocer now be pioneering some Bitcoin project, a currency unintelligible to many of us, the terms and conditions of which are probably as convoluted as the rules for earning eBucks?

The division of responsibilities for the provision of services is becoming increasingly blurred.

What some may consider “progress” is, to others, merely adding complexity and inconvenience to our daily lives. —