The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa

dc.contributor.advisorRanchhod, Vimal
dc.contributor.authorPillay, Nuvika
dc.date.accessioned2024-07-02T10:03:27Z
dc.date.available2024-07-02T10:03:27Z
dc.date.issued2023
dc.date.updated2024-05-31T13:12:36Z
dc.description.abstractThis paper analyses how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted money-metric poverty in South Africa. Against a backdrop of already rising poverty-levels, the pandemic is expected to have a devastating impact on the most vulnerable population groups. Using the recently released 2020 and 2021 General Households Surveys, this thesis presents the first nationally representative estimates of poverty during the heart of the pandemic and as the country began economically recovering. The comparability of the General Household Surveys conducted telephonically during the pandemic is interrogated. The paper finds that an estimated 2.8 million people entered upper-bound poverty and an additional 1.5 million people were food poor in 2020. The increase in poverty would have been substantially worse without the additional COVID-19 grant top-ups. The 2021 poverty estimates report a dramatic poverty recovery by October 2021, with estimated poverty levels lower than they were in 2019. Even vulnerable groups, like female-headed or black-headed households, experience this fall in extreme poverty. The surprising result is explained by the continuation of the Social Relief of Distress grant into 2021 which provides the ‘working poor', and large number of South Africans unemployed prior to the pandemic, grant support they were previously excluded from
dc.identifier.apacitationPillay, N. (2023). <i>The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa</i>. (). ,Faculty of Commerce ,School of Economics. Retrieved from http://hdl.handle.net/11427/40150en_ZA
dc.identifier.chicagocitationPillay, Nuvika. <i>"The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa."</i> ., ,Faculty of Commerce ,School of Economics, 2023. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/40150en_ZA
dc.identifier.citationPillay, N. 2023. The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa. . ,Faculty of Commerce ,School of Economics. http://hdl.handle.net/11427/40150en_ZA
dc.identifier.ris TY - Thesis / Dissertation AU - Pillay, Nuvika AB - This paper analyses how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted money-metric poverty in South Africa. Against a backdrop of already rising poverty-levels, the pandemic is expected to have a devastating impact on the most vulnerable population groups. Using the recently released 2020 and 2021 General Households Surveys, this thesis presents the first nationally representative estimates of poverty during the heart of the pandemic and as the country began economically recovering. The comparability of the General Household Surveys conducted telephonically during the pandemic is interrogated. The paper finds that an estimated 2.8 million people entered upper-bound poverty and an additional 1.5 million people were food poor in 2020. The increase in poverty would have been substantially worse without the additional COVID-19 grant top-ups. The 2021 poverty estimates report a dramatic poverty recovery by October 2021, with estimated poverty levels lower than they were in 2019. Even vulnerable groups, like female-headed or black-headed households, experience this fall in extreme poverty. The surprising result is explained by the continuation of the Social Relief of Distress grant into 2021 which provides the ‘working poor', and large number of South Africans unemployed prior to the pandemic, grant support they were previously excluded from DA - 2023 DB - OpenUCT DP - University of Cape Town KW - Economics LK - https://open.uct.ac.za PY - 2023 T1 - The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa TI - The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa UR - http://hdl.handle.net/11427/40150 ER - en_ZA
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/11427/40150
dc.identifier.vancouvercitationPillay N. The impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa. []. ,Faculty of Commerce ,School of Economics, 2023 [cited yyyy month dd]. Available from: http://hdl.handle.net/11427/40150en_ZA
dc.language.rfc3066Eng
dc.publisher.departmentSchool of Economics
dc.publisher.facultyFaculty of Commerce
dc.subjectEconomics
dc.titleThe impact of COVID-19 on poverty in South Africa
dc.typeThesis / Dissertation
dc.type.qualificationlevelMasters
dc.type.qualificationlevelMCom
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