This article was first published by News24 on 15 April 2026
South Africa sits with an official unemployment rate of 31.4%, and an expanded unemployment rate – which includes those who have given up looking for work – of 42.1%. The multiple plans of the state to curb unemployment have not moved the needle; as such, a different perspective is needed, one grounded in the right to choose.
The Job Seekers Exemption Certificate (JSEC) is a policy proposal by the Free Market Foundation that exemplifies this right to choose. The JSEC is a voluntarily obtained certificate that seeks to exempt its holder from the ambit of all labour legislation for a period of two years.
The JSEC is premised on the fundamental principle that every individual has an innate right to define their own destiny and make their own choices. Labour legislation, on the other hand, seeks to make certain choices, such as the rate of compensation (minimum wage) and specific employment conditions on behalf of the potential worker.
Labour laws claim to serve society at large in their purpose. Maybe they do, but policy should always be judged by its impact, not by its intent. Multiple studies by international financial organizations have consistently shown that South Africa’s labour legal system acts as a structural barrier to reducing unemployment.
As recently as February 2026, the IMF released its yearly Article IV consultation report on the South African economy. Again, the IMF identified the labour market rigidities as a structural barrier to solving unemployment. Our dismissal processes are too onerous, making hiring and firing less attractive for small businesses overall.
The World Bank, in its 2021 South Africa Economic Update, also raised similar concerns about the lack of dynamism (workers’ ability to leave roles and enter different ones) in our labour market, which it attributed to our rigid labour laws.
On top of that, this World Bank report noted a point that organisations like the FMF have consistently raised: South Africa’s labour regime creates winners in the workers who are fortunate enough to keep their jobs and enjoy these protections from the state, and losers who are locked out of the job market and cannot get jobs as a result.
The OECD Economic Survey for South Africa of 2025 also raises the same issue regarding the regulatory barriers to curbing unemployment in South Africa. The industry-wide collective bargaining agreements stifle smaller businesses, as do onerous regulations governing hiring, employment, and firing, especially for small businesses.
These studies by these organisations echo the sentiments of the Free Market Foundation and provide a factual basis, beyond the principled one, for the conceptualisation and advocacy of the JSEC. To have any impact on the unemployment rate, the labour market must be freed.
The JSEC would tackle the problem of a strict labour legal system for businesses by making it more appealing for potential employers to hire those who choose to obtain it. The JSEC would give the so-called ‘losers’ who are excluded from the South African job market the option to opt out of labour regulations that serve as structural barriers to their employment.
An adage by the French political economist Frédéric Bastiat should be kept in mind whenever discussing policy – namely, the seen and the unseen. The ‘seen’ effects of labour legislation are increased benefits that workers accrue from their employers.
The unseen effect of this regulatory regime is the static, inert labour market it creates; the negative yet small effect on employment, according to the Department of Labour’s Minimum Wage Report; and, generally, the high structural unemployment rate we currently have.
The unemployment crisis in South Africa has been studied ad nauseam, and the answer remains the same. Our labour regulatory/legal regime is a structural barrier to decreasing the unemployment rate. This subsequently affects economic growth levels and everything that depends on it.
No government plan can absorb the millions of unemployed. What is needed is the loosening of regulations in general that discourage employment creation. Until then, the JSEC is the best policy, grounded in the agency of every individual, to chart the course of their own destiny, from what they want to be to the specific terms of how they will be employed.
The Free Market Foundation, in its Liberty First project, has identified South Africa’s regulatory regime as needing a reorientation towards freedom. The JSEC is part of the Liberty First proposals and, as has been argued for above, represents the most targeted and thus most impactful solution to South Africa’s unemployment crisis.
