Burger said that on average a white worker completes more years of education than the average black worker — 12.6 years as opposed to 8.8 — who also “still receives an education of inferior quality.”
“This is a remnant of the apartheid legacy which the department of education has so far been unable to rectify,” Burger said, adding the unemployment rate for blacks is five times higher than that of whites.
Policy responses to the economic inequality caused by the apartheid system have centered on increasing funding for black schools, affirmative action and land redistribution.
Burger and Jafta found affirmative action had led to a narrowing of wage differences for the top, most highly paid jobs, but had “had no observable effect on the racial employment gap.”
The key therefore to achieving a more equal distribution of wages among the white, black and mixed race population is harmonizing education standards across the country, commentators say.
But this most vital of objectives is far from being achieved.
“Former white schools are still pretty good, but we still see in African townships that schools are dysfunctional,” Roodt said.
Schussler agreed, saying: “We are spending a lot on education and we’re just not getting the results we need.”
RSS