Are things really that bad in SA?

maumau said:
Your second point is wrong
Don't make children if you are not yet financially stable in South Africa.
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Wrong according to who? You?

And why not make children if you are financially stable?
Send them to a good school (does not have to be a premium luxury private school) and ensure they gain the skills and education to go overseas if they cannot find a job in SA after finished studying (or studying in SA). In other words, equip them to make a success themselves, and nurture the development of success characteristics (like the ones I listed in the table?) in them.
 
SauRoNZA said:
Probably a **** on of debt you don't see or hear about.
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Not true. I know many of them and they don't have debt, except maybe for a car or a house. Many other people in the world have house and car debt.

It is a false default assertion that everytime you see someone having a good time, they must have tons of debt.
Why by default explain their success in terms of a "negative" factor?
Why not first assume a "positive" factor?
 
Bassist said:
Not true. I know many of them and they don't have debt, except maybe for a car or a house. Many other people in the world have house and car debt.

It is a false default assertion that everytime you see someone having a good time, they must have tons of debt.
Why by default explain their success in terms of a "negative" factor?
Why not first assume a "positive" factor?
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Because very very few people actually have a net positive balance and do in fact live from one month to another even when they don't necessarily have tons of (irregular) debt.

So sure they may not have major debts, but they may also not have any positive investment either and what you are seeing as their "success" is everything they are pissing away month to month.

So let's use a positive factor then and look at net worth....very quickly you'll find that "positive" number is actually a negative for all those people.
 
How much do you think the numbers are? How much income do people (let's say a couple and one child) who live in, say, a rented 2-bedroomed flat in a reasonable area, or a suburban non-super-top-luxury house, need to cover their expenses? What do you think their debt it, say, for a car? I'm just interested. Could anyone put a number on this, so as to compare it to some of the ways to economise.

Put another way, please could someone venture some advice, as they might give to a 25- to 35-year-old adult child who's moving out of their parents' home for the first time, including budget factors you might remind them that they need, and how best to handle their money (and other resources?) so as to succeed?
 
SauRoNZA said:
Because very very few people actually have a net positive balance and do in fact live from one month to another even when they don't necessarily have tons of (irregular) debt.

So sure they may not have major debts, but they may also not have any positive investment either and what you are seeing as their "success" is everything they are pissing away month to month.
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I did not observe their success as doing activities that cost money.
Many activities cost little or no money - just walking on some unspoilt beach* (although not possible at the moment!?) is a priviledge that many in Europe cannot enjoy. That is really "living the live" - and you don't need to take out debt from ABSA or DirectAxis to do this!!

SauRoNZA said:
So let's use a positive factor then and look at net worth....very quickly you'll find that "positive" number is actually a negative for all those people.
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No, I meant the other positive factors (see my table).

  • You get happy, innovative, outgoing people with some debt that remain in SA.
  • Others are gloomy, complaining, leave SA but hey, at least they don't have debt.
Who would you rather be? Or try to be?

* On many European beaches, you have to PAY to enter the beach!
 
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Gozado said:
How much do you think the numbers are? How much income do people (let's say a couple and one child) who live in, say, a rented 2-bedroomed flat in a reasonable area, or a suburban non-super-top-luxury house, need to cover their expenses? What do you think their debt it, say, for a car? I'm just interested. Could anyone put a number on this, so as to compare it to some of the ways to economise.

Put another way, please could someone venture some advice, as they might give to a 25- to 35-year-old adult child who's moving out of their parents' home for the first time, including budget factors you might remind them that they need, and how best to handle their money (and other resources?) so as to succeed?
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It's an interesting request to which I'd venture a response, based on some friends I know well enough.

For the couple and the child (per month):
Rent: R10000
Food: R10000
Car payment: 2x R4000
Insurances: R2000 (total)
Child daycare / school: R1000
Medical aid: R6000 (for the whole family)
Entertainment / saving for holiday: R5000
TOTAL: R42000
Total Salary of both the man and woman combined: Needs to be at least R65,000 p/m. Anything about that, use as savings / gym / DSTV / Netflix / "cool activities"
VERDICT: expenses are reasonable/realistic and salary is reasonable/realistic.

For the 25- to 35-year-old adult child who's moving out of their parents' home for the first time:
Rent: R10000
Food: R5000
Car payment: R4000
Insurance: R1000
Medical aid: R2000
Entertainment / saving for holiday: R2500
TOTAL: R24500
Total Salary of the adult child: Needs to be at least R39,000* p/m. Anything about that, use as savings, or to pay off study debt, or gym / DSTV / Netflix / "cool activities"
VERDICT: expenses are reasonable/realistic and salary is reasonable/realistic.

TOTAL VERDICT: So what's the problem? All of the above is possible, whilst at the same time enjoying the sunny SA lifestyle, and even the occasional gourmet burger face stuffing session in Kloof street and one craft beer.

Edit to add: Rent in a European city is at least half of your bruto salary. For that you get a shitty chicken-coop apartment. Then we're not even adding food which is a much larger proportion than in SA. Consider that for a moment?

* Software developers are one of the most in-demand professionals in South Africa. The average developer's salary is around R39 298 (Source: OfferZen, 2020. Link: https://www.offerzen.com/blog/developer-salaries-in-cape-town-vs-johannesburg)
 
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Bassist said:
I updated my list now, based on the last comment:

Here is the updated table of characteristics I have gathered so far, for those SA success people:

Characteristic​
Need loads of money?​
Need lily pond upbringing?​
1. friendly, positive, charismaticnono. some people are born a p*** but it can be learned to be nice to other people
2. resourceful, outgoing, helpful, innovativenono. you can become resourceful by listening.
3. physically attractivenoyes. Some people are born beautiful, others ugly as hell.
4. youngnon/a. But you can't change your age.
5. knows many friends, have a huge support network, both career-wise and private/socialnono. but being nice to people would help build a network from scratch.
6. very witty and street wisenono
7. able to make "correct" life decisions based on their personal contextsnono, but you probably need proper parenting.
8. does some form of active sportmaybe, depends which sportno, unless you are born paraplegic.
9. strong mental energy. "Get up and go" attitudenono
10. travel a lot, even if on a tight budgetsomewhat. But if you have lots of friends (see above) you can stay over with them or share transport costs if travelling with them.no
11. socialise with other people to maintain/expand their network, instead of staying home and playing games / watching Netflix.nono
12. Raise their standards and expectations, instead of lowering them just to be able to feel "successful"maybeno

Let's grow the list or narrow down. We are getting closer to the magic formula successful people in SA use that allow them to stay on in godforsaken Africa!
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Issues.... :ROFL:
 
Bassist said:
Make sure you don't lose your job, by aligning yourself to be indispendable in your company and what you do.
Don't make children if you are not yet financially stable.
Eat and live healthy so that you are not prone to increasing illnesses.
Work in an industry that is least affected by any particular economic crisis. A friend of mine did freelance marketing for Zoom. He is making a killing now.
Keep up the success with your friends to avoid becoming the 3rd wheel. Better even, lead the success of your friends circle, so that if anyone, one of them would become the 3rd wheel. Lead, don't follow.

They are not skating on the edge of disaster, thereby your whole phrased question is moot.
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You think that call center agents living in shared apartments "like bums" in the CBD in a highly challenged country, while living it up in Kloof street are not skating on the edge of disaster? Or that they are likely to have any of the above characteristics?
 
Bassist said:
Wrong according to who? You?

And why not make children if you are financially stable?
Send them to a good school (does not have to be a premium luxury private school) and ensure they gain the skills and education to go overseas if they cannot find a job in SA after finished studying (or studying in SA). In other words, equip them to make a success themselves, and nurture the development of success characteristics (like the ones I listed in the table?) in them.
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Yes me, that's why so many emigrate :ROFL:
 
Bassist said:
I get bombarded by messages from friends on Whatsapp and FB, just showing how nice lifestyles they are living. Photos galore.

They are not necessarily rich. And most don't live in The Boord or Constantia. But they have struck some formula for being successful in SA. It has a lot to do with networking, the right attitude, and some luck.

They have jobs they can go to and evenings they chill in Kloof street, barefoot, in frokkies, bearded, and drive hip cars. They have friends with holiday homes and they get the best women. They have qualifications (or not) and can travel to Europe. It seems they always get help somewhere from someone, especially good leads for business, specials, deals, or taking care of their dog while they jet around the world.

They live the best lifestyle in SA, in Europe they would not have been able to afford such a lifestyle.

Discuss. What is their secret formula?
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Do you remember those friends who aren't posting constantly how wonderful their lives are on facebook?
 
Bassist said:
We have a lifestyle in SA (in several specific aspects) that is much, much harder to match in many first world countries Saffers tend to emigrate to.
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This is not in general true. Pretty much every comparison that I've seen that draws this conclusion is comparing apples to oranges. Yeah, you're not going to get a 4 bedroom house like you have in Somerset West in London, Amsterdam, Sydney or New York anytime soon, but there are far more to other countries than just their biggest cities.
 
Bassist said:
I did not observe their success as doing activities that cost money.
Many activities cost little or no money - just walking on some unspoilt beach* (although not possible at the moment!?) is a priviledge that many in Europe cannot enjoy. That is really "living the live" - and you don't need to take out debt from ABSA or DirectAxis to do this!!


No, I meant the other positive factors (see my table).

  • You get happy, innovative, outgoing people with some debt that remain in SA.
  • Others are gloomy, complaining, leave SA but hey, at least they don't have debt.
Who would you rather be? Or try to be?

* On many European beaches, you have to PAY to enter the beach!
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You think people leave because they have debt :ROFL: :ROFL: :ROFL: :ROFL: :ROFL:

/signing out OP must be trolling
 
Bassist said:
It's an interesting request to which I'd venture a response, based on some friends I know well enough.

For the couple and the child (per month):
Rent: R10000
Food: R10000
Car payment: 2x R4000
Insurances: R2000 (total)
Child daycare / school: R1000
Medical aid: R6000 (for the whole family)
Click to expand...

These two numbers seem very very off.

Groceries living a good life could happily be half of that for 2 1/2 people unless they are eating out once a week or only shopping at Woolworths.

On the flipside, childcare is NOT going to be R1000 a month, at least not at any place where you'd actually be happy leaving your child, especially if you seemingly otherwise make enough money to afford better.
 
Bassist said:
Who would you rather be? Or try to be?
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I'm still quite happy living in SA and I wasn't addressing that at all.

I was questioning your measure of success seemingly relating to how well off people are by observation only.

Everything you alluded to in your first post ties in with having money available in some way, shape, or form to be able to do the things they so casually do from your observation.

It's the having enough (month to month) not to need to care about their budgets until it catches up a few years down the line and they realise they have nothing to show for it but Instagram photos.
 
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Having nice stuff does not necessarily equal quality of life.

Quality of Life Index
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(higher is better) is an estimation of overall quality of life by using an empirical formula which takes into account purchasing power index (higher is better), pollution index (lower is better), house price to income ratio (lower is better), cost of living index (lower is better), safety index (higher is better), health care index (higher is better), traffic commute time index (lower is better) and climate index (higher is better).
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Quality of Life Index by Country 2026 Mid-Year

www.numbeo.com www.numbeo.com

IMG_20200709_185819.jpg
IMG_20200709_185836.jpg
 
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