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The chart below shows that had the South African economy grown at 5% a year since 2008, a similar rate to many of its emerging-market peers, it would have been about twice the size it is today.

The chart shows that whilst the size of the South African economy is about R4.7 trillion today, it would have been R9.0 trillion in real terms had the economy kept up with top-end emerging market growth rates.

The chart below shows that on a per-capita basis South Africa would then have been almost twice as well off as it is today.

The Common Sense took that GDP data and modelled poverty numbers and forecasts against them, using definitions of poverty from Statistics South Africa (Stats SA).

Stats SA uses three different poverty lines. These are the food-poverty line, the lower-bound poverty line, and the upper-bound poverty line.

People who fall under the food-poverty line cannot afford basic food requirements, before even paying for other essentials such as clothing, transport, or housing. This measures extreme poverty.

The lower-bound poverty line adds a very limited allowance for essential non-food expenses to the food-poverty line. People below it must go without some essentials or sacrifice food to pay for them.

The upper-bound poverty line allows for basic food and essential non-food needs without having to sacrifice one for the other. However, being above this line does not mean someone is comfortably off; they have simply passed this basic-needs poverty threshold.

The chart below shows the number and proportion of South Africans who fall into each poverty category in 2025, compared to what the numbers and proportions would have been had the economy grown at 5% a year since 2008.

The share and number of people living within the food poverty line would be half of what it is falling from 17.6% or 11.1 million people to nearer 8% or 4.8 million people – a difference of 6.3 million people.

The share and number of people living within the lower-bound poverty line would have fallen from 37.0% or 23.9 million people to nearer 21% or 13.2 million people – a difference of 10.7 million people.

The share and number of people living within the upper-bound poverty line would have fallen from 66.7% or 42.1 million people to nearer 47% or 29.8 million people – a difference of 12.2 million people.

This is why economic growth is so important and why growth in and of itself is the means through which transformation and redress can best be achieved. Any policies that obstruct investment and growth thereby have the consequences of sustaining unnecessarily high levels of poverty and the political consequences that flow from these.