Extreme inequality in South Africa is constraining growth and investment

Extreme inequality in South Africa is constraining growth and investment: New analysis by the World Bank has confirmed that South Africa’s is not only the world’s most unequal country, but that extreme inequality has become a major constraint to higher levels of economic growth, because it is undermining policy certainty and depressing investment. The bank’s latest South Africa Economic Update, which focuses on the theme of jobs and inequality, notes that, at 0.63, South Africa’s 2015 Gini coefficient was the highest internationally and that inequality had worsened since 1994, despite a decline in poverty. The Gini coefficient is the measure of income inequality, ranging from 0 to 1, with 0 representing a perfectly equal society and 1 represents a perfectly unequal society.