The latest employment data from Stats SA shows that the jobs crisis for domestic workers in South Africa continues, with thousands more jobs lost in the latest quarter. According to Stats SA, 23,000 domestic worker jobs were lost in the second quarter of 2024 (April to June), taking the total number of workers employed to 843,000. This is a 3% drop in employment in the sector.
Adding to the pain for domestic workers, there was also a year-on-year decline in the number of employed, though this was a much smaller loss of 1,000 workers—a drop of 0.1%. The worrying detail in the data is that South Africa is still employing about 150,000 fewer domestic workers than before the Covid-19 pandemic at the start of 2020.
This has been the case for the last four years, with the country unable to recover to pre-pandemic levels representing a likely permanent loss of jobs in the sector. Pre-Covid-19, South Africa employed over 1 million domestic workers. Industry reports pointed to around 250,000 domestic workers losing their jobs during the pandemic.
By the end of 2023, only around 125,000 of those jobs had been recovered—a 50% recovery rate. The latest employment data has further dented this, meaning around 161,000 domestic worker jobs are still lost, and total employment is still around 16% lower than pre-pandemic levels. Like other informal work in South Africa, domestic worker positions are often seasonal and fluctuate from quarter-to-quarter.
However, looking at the historical tr.