WASHINGTON\u2014 South Africa is the most unequal country in the world, with race playing a determining factor in a society here 10 percent of the population owns more than 80 percent of the wealth, a<\/P>
World Bank report said.<\/P>
\u201cSouth Africa \u2026 is the most unequal country in the world, ranking first among 164 countries,\u201d the Washington-based institution said in a report called \u2018Inequality in Southern Africa\u2019.<\/P>
Nearly thirty years after the end of apartheid, \u201crace remains a key driver of high inequality in South Africa, due to its impact on education and the labor market,\u201d it said.<\/P>
When race is considered as a factor in income disparities, the report added, \u201cits contribution to income inequality amounts to 41 percent, while contribution of education is reduced to 30 percent.\u201d<\/P>
\u201cThe legacy of colonialism and apartheid, rooted in racial and spatial segregation, continues to reinforce inequality.\u201d<\/P>
The country\u2019s neighbours that make up the rest of the Southern African Customs Union \u2014 Botswana, Eswatini, Lesotho and Namibia \u2014 all finish high on the list of the most unequal countries in the world.<\/P>
Gender also plays an important role.<\/P>
In the region, women earn on average 30 percent less than men with the same level of education.<\/P>
The pay gap between men and women reaches 38 percent in Namibia and South Africa.<\/P>
The uneven distribution of agricultural land is also a factor driving inequality, especially in rural areas.<\/P>
In Namibia, 70 percent of the 39.7 million hectares of commercial agricultural land \u201cstill belong to Namibians of European descent\u201d, the World Bank said.<\/P>
The report was produced before the Covid-19 pandemic and its authors used the Gini coefficient \u2014 an indicator of income inequality \u2014 to rank countries.<\/P>
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Source: NAM NEWS NETWORK<\/P>
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WASHINGTON\u2014 South Africa is the most unequal country in the world, with race playing a determining factor in a society here 10 percent of the population owns more than 80 percent of the wealth, aWorld Bank report said.\u201cSouth Africa \u2026 is the most unequa…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\n