INDEBTEDNESS OF FINANCIALLY VULNERABLE HOUSEHOLDS: WHAT DO SOCIAL WORKERS DO?
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.15270/45-2-212Abstract
Household debt in South Africa has grown significantly relative to income over the past twentyyears under the guise of financial liberalisation (FinMark Trust, 2007). Currently households
spend approximately 60c to 70c of every rand of their income on repayment of debt (Gous,
2008; Van Rooyen, 2008a). During the past decade the disposable income, financial assets and
net prosperity of households have therefore not accrued to the same extent as their debt
obligations. For this reason households’ savings are urgently needed to contribute to a
lessening of the country’s current account deficit in order to sustain economic growth and job
creation (Van Tonder, 2008). On the macro level, economic growth and job creation form part
of the ideal underpinning the social development philosophy in South Africa. This ideal is to
combine social welfare assistance with developmental strategies, thereby promoting both
economic and social development in order to strengthen people’s capacity to enhance their
social and economic inclusion and alleviate poverty (Patel, 2005:118). Social work, as a
profession within the social development paradigm, is primarily focused on the poorest of the
poor households (Department of Social Development, 2006). In the context of a relative
poverty line, set in relation to changing standards of living (Statistics South Africa, 2007), a
poor household is to be understood when the household’s condition of poverty endures over a
period of time, when the household has an inability or lack of opportunity to improve its
circumstances over time, or to sustain itself through difficult times (Aliber, 2001:2). Research
(Collins, 2007; Rand, 2004) has shown that poor households have the highest debt to income
ratio. For this reason social work intervention focusing on household debt is also essential on
the micro level within the social development paradigm in order to reduce households’
financial vulnerability (Engelbrecht, 2008a).
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