Politicians are not like us. They don’t shop like us. They don’t celebrate the festive season like us. They need to learn.
There are a lot of things ordinary, middle-class South Africans do that rich people, and particularly our politicians and senior government officials, do not do.
The elite have no idea what it’s like to shop around for the lowest prices for groceries, and to go to different shops just because they have different prices for basic foodstuffs.
They don’t know what it’s like to check your bank balance as you get to the cash register, or to keep a few things behind in case you have to put them back because you don’t have enough money.
They don’t know what it is to drive a car with the check engine light on. For months.
They have never had to let a domestic worker go because they simply couldn’t afford her wages anymore. They are oblivious to the time (and energy) it takes out of a day to make a bed, do the dishes, clean the house, feed the dogs, do the laundry, mow the lawn or scrub the toilets.
When a rich person says they’d rather not waste money on eating out it’s never because they literally don’t have enough money to do so.
They’ll never know what it’s like to have to pawn household goods, jewellery or furniture just to make the rent.
They don’t know what it’s like not to be able to take time off, or being able to take leave but not being able to fly somewhere, or even drive somewhere, for a getaway.
No idea
Our politicians and government officials have no idea what it’s like to wash clothing in the bath because the washing machine doesn’t wash, or to pack ice in the fridge because the refrigerator doesn’t refrigerate, and there’s just no money to fix them.
They have never needed to take a loan at an extortionate interest rate disguised as a fat once-off administration fee. They never have to dodge phone calls from debt collectors.
The political class never has to wait for buses, trains or taxis. They never have to wait at a laundromat for the washing to get done. The most waiting they ever have to do is in the comfort of their offices or homes, waiting for a driver to arrive, or waiting at the bar for a table at an exclusive restaurant.
The elite has no idea what it’s like to grit your teeth and struggle through illness, or a bad tooth, because you’d rather not have to pay for a doctor or dentist, or take a day off to wait at a government clinic.
They have never had to worry about not being able to pay for childcare while they’re out working or lunching on the taxpayer’s dime.
They never have to buy clothes at thrift stores or charity shops.
Christmas
The elite don’t know what it’s like to have to explain to a child that although they got a nice Christmas present last year, this year it’ll be just a t-shirt, because there’s no money for more.
They don’t know what it’s like to buy poor quality products that wear out or break in a matter of months, because there simply is no money for the more expensive product that can last years.
They have no experience of buying cheap junk on AliExpress or Temu or Shein, because they simply can’t afford the prices local retailers charge for toys, textiles or technology.
The biggest difficulty the elite have with Christmas lunch is to get a booking. For the rest of us, the question is whether we can afford a special meal at all.
Our politicians will never know what it’s like to bulk up meals with cheap starches, or to skip meals so your kids can eat.
If you earn a seven-digit annual salary, the festive season can be very festive, indeed.
For the rest of South Africa, the vast swathes of the poor and unemployed, and increasingly the middle class, too, the festive season is, of late, not very festive at all.
Economic advice
This is why our advice to politicians on economic matters is so important. We’re not just playing cheap politics. This isn’t some ivory-tower struggle of economic theory and political ideology. The “battle of ideas” isn’t just an intellectual game.
We’re watching, and experiencing, the terrible impact that poor economic policy has on the people of South Africa, and we’d like to see those policies reversed.
Instead of the demonstrated failure of government-led growth, which has produced no growth at all, we’d like to see economic freedom flourish, which has produced vigorous growth, prosperity and poverty relief everywhere it has been tried.
It is critical that politicians, even though they have no personal experience of the struggles of even middle-income people, think hard about their policies. Are they good for ordinary people, or do they just benefit special interest groups who can afford to fund lobby groups and plead for government protection?
Temu
Take Temu, for example. There’s been a lot of to-ing and fro-ing about whether Chinese retailers pay the appropriate import tariffs on products they sell into South Africa, or whether they dodge those duties by, for example, splitting orders into multiple smaller orders that don’t attract duties. There’s been a lot of handwringing about the fate of domestic retailers in the face of competition from cheap Chinese imports.
The reality is that people wouldn’t take the risk of buying from China if they could afford local prices in the first place. If someone is buying from Temu, chances are good that their choice is not between Temu and a local retailer, but between buying from Temu and not being able to afford anything at all.
If someone orders a gift for their children from a discount retailer overseas, what moral right does the government have to tell them they must pay a 25% levy to fund the government’s own massive salary bill?
Tariffs directly target and hurt the people who are already struggling. They literally steal presents out of the hands of children.
When people import goods, they’re not the victims of rapacious foreign retailers. They’re taking advantage of the efficiency of foreign manufacturers and the willingness of foreign retailers to sell goods at razor-thin profit margins. The alternative would be to pay higher prices for less efficient domestic manufacturing and retailing.
People who buy from retailers like Temu shouldn’t be paying import tariffs at all.
Incentives
Competition and the efficient division of labour is how productivity and prosperity have grown exponentially for hundreds of years. There is no reason to believe this relationship doesn’t hold across borders.
Imports always make us better off. Tariffs always make us poorer.
Import tariffs are a regressive tax that hit the poor the hardest. They divert money from the poor and the middle class to the government, which is money that otherwise could have been spent elsewhere in the economy, thereby stimulating economic growth.
They remove the incentive for domestic rivals of global firms to improve their efficiency, which has further impoverishing effects on local consumers, slows down growth, and makes local companies less able to compete internationally.
When companies ask the government for tariff protection, the fat-cat officials on their seven-digit salaries should put themselves not in the shoes of the domestic company that claims to be harmed by the competition, but in the shoes of the consumer, who benefits from the competition.
Shoes
Put yourself in the shoes of the middle-class family that laid off a domestic worker this year, can’t afford to go on holiday, but has to pay a tariff to the government just to be allowed to buy at least a little something for their kids for Christmas.
Put yourself in the shoes of that domestic worker who got laid off, but now has to pay a premium to the government for the privilege of buying a chicken for her dinner, or buying some clothes for her children, just so the shareholders of a large corporation can sleep easier at night.
South Africa’s non-existent economic growth is a direct result of poor economic policy choices, of which import tariffs are just one.
That the numbers of the poor and unemployed are growing, and even the middle class has to pinch every penny, is a direct consequence of bad decisions by rich politicians who have only ever had to let out their ample belts, and have never had to tighten them.
This festive season, the political elite would do well to contemplate on whose behalf they govern. Do they make policy for themselves and their equally well-paid corporate cronies, or do they govern on behalf of the broad mass of South African consumers? Because it’s the consumers who pay the hardest price for their mistakes.
If you can still afford it, have a festive season. And if not, I hope that you get to spend some inexpensive but quality time with your family and friends, at least.
[Image: Front page of the Chinese online retailer, Temu, viewed from South Africa. Screenshot by the author.
The views of the writer are not necessarily the views of the Daily Friend or the IRR.
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