South Africa’s domestic worker sector has managed to recover about half of the jobs lost during the Covid-19 pandemic and associated lockdowns, according to BusinessTech.
The platform reports that the latest data from Statistics South Africa showed a positive trend, with 17 000 more workers finding employment in the sector over the last three months of 2023.
There were also 13 000 more workers employed in the sector compared to Q4 2022.
Overall, 2023 saw about 79 000 domestic worker jobs recovered from the year’s start of 797 000 employed.
BusinessTech points out, however, that the total of 876 000 workers employed in the sector is still a long way from the one million domestic workers employed before the pandemic.
The pandemic and the government’s lockdown interventions in 2020 resulted in the loss of 250 000 domestic worker jobs in the first half of the year.
BusinessTech reports that only around 125 000 of these jobs have been recovered – a 50% recovery rate.
Domestic worker jobs are inextricably tied to the economic prospects for private households and the performance of the wider economy. For hard-hit households in tough economic times, luxuries like domestic help are often the first expenses to go.
In this context, the prospects for domestic workers in South Africa look dim.
[Image: Alice Morrison, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=63217151]