Welcome to the first edition of the Genius Level annual South African Salary Survey. This survey is a comprehensive overview of salaries earned by Black South Africans in the year 2017.
Disclaimer: The results of this survey represent the views of the individuals who participated in this survey. Much thanks to Mzanzi Humor page for assisting in distributing the survey to their many followers. In our view our sample size is sufficient enough to warrant statistical analysis.
To explain the overall calculation, the salary values indicate the average salaries earned by the participants in this survey, it won’t necessarily mean the value given is the rate as to which one should expect to be compensated. For example, if one person earns R600K a year and another R200K a year, the average salary will in this case be R400K. The R400K being the average and not what everybody earns, the R200K being the lowest contributor to the average and the R600K being the highest contributor. Salary is influenced by a number of factors such as age, working experience, industry, skill sets and many other factors.
Let’s jump right into its shall we! This Survey is proudly brought to you by Genius Level!! ‘Let Your Ideas Outlive You’
Before we jump into further analysis of the results I thought it would be a good idea to highlight just some of the Job Titles that carry with them high salaries as per survey results. The average salary for these job titles is well above R600K per year. They range from fields such as Engineering, Law, IT, Accounting and Finance. These are are positions that require highly skilled individuals with the experience to match, hence the translation into higher salaries.
The average salary in the survey came to R224 274, above we split the average salary results by work experience as the longer you have been working, the higher your pay is likely to be.
Moving to average salary by field of study, not a surprise to see Doctors right at the top of the fields as Doctors are some of the most highly skilled and sort after individuals within the country and outside. Law, Engineering and Commerce follow well still within the R200K – R300K range.
We then looked as the big cities within South Africa, the average that one can earn if they are living in Cape Town, Johannesburg, Pretoria and Durban is R240K. One should expect more often than not to earn a lower salary if they choose to take appointment in a different city, unless of-course they getting a transfer from one subsidiary to another or moving to a different branch but still within the same company. As explained at the initial, this average salary represents the average salary earned within this cities, there will be cases of individuals earning more and less than the R240K given their skill sets, experience, etc.
We then went and analysed the average salary by field of study further, as per above we split the averages by gender; and as common knowledge may have it, males came up top in ALL the fields.
– A female Doctor can expect to earn 30% less than their male counterparts
– Even worse in the Law field, females earn 56% less than their male counterparts
– In Engineering men earn 20% more on average vs females
– Women earn 48% less than men in commerce
– 47% less in humanities and,
– 35% less in the marketing Field.
The top 3 highest paying industries are Energy, Commerce and Mining, at the bottom is Agriculture, Retail and Hotels & Restaurants.
Here at Genius Level we do things differently as you should have noticed. We took the whole survey experience further and attempted to gain an understanding as to what other factors not known to us are driving forces for salary averages and what high or low salaries lead to eventually.
We asked our participants if they where home owners (in this case having a bond), renting or staying at home with their parents or relatives. The current climate in south Africa is that most of the working force is centered around the big cities and as such, many South Africans leave their villages and home towns and travel to Jhb, Durban and the likes in hopes of a better life… This brings with it, a need to find accommodation in these areas, which adds a further burden to their pockets.
Some interesting findings here:-
– Home owners on average earn 56% more than those who are renting
– Home owners earn more than 2 times more money their the individuals staying at home on average
-Those who are renting earn 41% more than individuals staying at home.
some further analysis from this; employees who have taken out a bond or are home owners are in that situation because they can afford given the higher salaries they earn, meaning if I own a house, I do so because I can afford it, if I’m renting out an apartment, I do so because I cannot afford to buy a house as yet, and the ones who stay at home do so because their salaries on average do not allow them to move out and to go rent out a place or buy a house. A house is also seen as a trapping of success, usually bond payments, rates, levies and taxes can do some damage to one’s pocket, struggling to pay these can lead one to seeking extra sources of income or realising that they need to invest more in their work to earn a better salary than currently.
More interesting findings, those that already have a side business apart from their corporate employment earn a higher salary on average vs those who have no intentions of starting one, this represents a 37% variance in salary. Those with plans of starting a business are on the same salary level on average as to those who are undecided.
Those who have plans to start a business earn 13% more than those who do not intent on starting a business.
The stats proves that ambition and a little push in terms of responsibilities makes one a highly sort after commodity. Having the ability to create and manage your own business builts in one sort after skills such as leadership, better planning, ability to focus on creating value and being able to manage people, Corporates are willing to pay a premium for individuals with such skills; and where can one learn this? Well starting your own business seems to be a good start as per the stats.
On average, employees with a mentor earn 9% more than those who do not.
-According to the stats, on average, employees that drink earn 10% more than those who do not.
Why is this the case one may ask? Do not shoot the messenger but my two cents is that, people who drink usually are sociable people, plus alcohol is a type of social drug that gets people to socialise more. The skills built from this is the ability to engage with people, being able to converse with strangers and be more outgoing, as such you eventually end up as an extrovert; and because you spend time being sociable, it makes it easier for such people to come alive in the working environment either it be during an interview, being able to sell themselves, communicate strategies, taking charge of a project or doing presentations to management. all such skills can aid in getting you a bigger cheque come month end.
-Those who engage in sporting activities and exercise earn on average 8% more than employees who no not engage in exercise or any sporting activity.
Yet again, please do not shoot the messenger! I’m merely here to deliver the results *side eye*
– On average people who listen to House music earn 10% more than those who prefer to listen to R&B
– Individuals who listen mostly to Hip Hop music earn on average 9% more than those who listen to House music and even more, they earn 20% more than those who prefer R&B
Drops Mic!!!!
We asked the survey participants if they had any plans to study further. The stats on these are split by age group.
– The 31-35 age group that said they had no plans to study further actually earned on average 28% more than those that said no. The driver behind this is that most of the individuals that said no already have studied further hence the higher salaries, the ones that said they do have plans to study further where most still needing to educate and get more skills that would aid them in commanding a higher pay.
– The above was the same case with the 26-30 and 21-25 age group, the ones who said they had plans to study further did so as they realise the need to educate and equip themselves with more sort after skills that would help rescue their current situation of lower pay vs those who are more educated and skilled than them.
Some more interesting finding! We maybe aught to adopt this as a Black Tax rate calculation. We asked our participants as to ho much Black tax do they pay, and in the results we attempted to get a correlation of average yearly salary earned to value of Black Tax paid.
-Those who earn over R360K contribute to their families around more than R6 000 to R7 000 a month
-Those earning R330K contribute around R3.5K to R4K
-Those earning R300K surprising contribute more than those earning R330K, they pay Black Tax to the value of around R4K to R6K
-Those earning on average R250K a year contribute the same Black Tax as to those earning R330K which is R3K to R3.5K (This salary average is mostly populated with individuals that are new to the working space by about 1 to 3 years, could be that this are individuals that are the first to get a University qualification and are from poor communities and as such feel the burden of having to assist their families.
The Germans seem to undoubtedly be the firm favorites for the Top eaners, with most on average individuals who earn above R300K choose to drive BMW, Benz and Audi.
Toyota is the first choice of most individuals earning R200K and less. Toyota is South Africa is most trusted car brand in terms of quality and affordability in terms of maintenance so its no wonder that its the firm favourite for those who are not yet able to afford higher valued sports cars. Hyundai, Kia and Toyota and all Asian brands, interesting to see them lined up as the first choice for all those earning below R250K.
For the above results we kept only the 25-30 age group to see how the results would compare to the total view. Not surprising that the average salary for the top 3 most sought after brands for the high earners has increased almost peaking the R500K mark, Hashtag #Blessed.
The Asian brands are still the firm favorites for those in the lower salary range.
Are you an avide reader? When if you are you then on average you should be making 15% more than individuals that do not…
If you looking to earn more, get yourself a book bruh!!! Or be sure to be a frequent visitor here… Talking about Genius Level, let’s jump to the final graph shall we.
We asked our survey participants if they have ever visited our platform Genius Level, if you visit our blog slash online magazine, then you are part of those that earn 14% more than the ones who do not.
So be sure to keep glued up to our online platform and keep getting those big bucks!!
In time we’ll be revisiting some of the stats to deep dive into them and try and explain the correlations.
This survey was brought to you by Genius Level, ‘Let Your Ideas Outlive You’
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