DebtBusters reported that earners born after 2000, account for 9% of new debt counselling applicants.
Times are tough financially – with the latest Gulf war making a bad situation worse – but there are worrying signs that South Africans are not careful enough with their money and getting themselves into horrific debt spirals.
It is incredible to think – as DebtBusters says in its latest analysis of consumer debt – that the country’s top earners, taking home more than R50 000 a month, needed 101% of their salary to service debt, while their debt-to-income ratio is 303%, the highest of all the income bands.
Other worrying facts emerge from the report, indicating that South Africans do not know how to manage debt.
The average unsecured debt levels are 23% higher than in 2021 and, most ominously, DebtBusters reported that earners born after 2000, account for 9% of new debt counselling applicants, which signals financial stress is beginning to affect a new generation earlier in their adult lives.
This all points to a lack of financial awareness, even among the higher qualified earners, who should know better.
The current maths literacy curriculum should be started earlier in the school career and made compulsory across all grades.
Otherwise, this financial ignorance is going to kill the futures of our young people.
