South Africa employment facts
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These are the 16 statutory values we hold for South Africa in Global Employment Facts (Employ Borderless), 13 of them read from a statute or the government that administers it. Each row names the page it came from, the date the figure took effect and the date a person last checked it. They are legal minimums, not what employers in South Africa actually offer, and they are what our three published indexes score South Africa on.
Robbin Schuchmann
Co-founder, Employ Borderless
What the law requires in South Africa
ZA| Field | Value | Unit | Tier | Source | Effective | Verified | Caveats |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Statutory paid annual leaveannual_leave_days | 15 | working days a year | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-16 | - |
| National public holidayspublic_holidays | 12 | days a year | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-16 | - |
| Statutory notice periodnotice_weeks | 4 | weeks | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Statutory severanceseverance_weeks | 5.3 | weeks | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Employer social contributionsemployer_ssc_rate | 1 | % of gross pay | Official | ISSA country profiles | 2024-01-01 | 2026-06-20 | - |
| Employee social contributionsemployee_ssc_rate | 1 | % of gross pay | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Statutory minimum wagemin_wage_monthly | 5,894.4 | a month | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Income tax bracketsincome_tax_brackets | 7 bands | - | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-03-01 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Top personal income tax ratepersonal_income_tax_top_rate | 45 | % | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-03-01 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Corporate tax ratecorporate_tax_rate | 27 | % | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-04-01 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Standard VAT ratevat_rate | 15 | % | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Statutory maternity leavematernity_leave_weeks | 17.3 | weeks | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| Statutory paternity leavepaternity_leave_weeks | 0 | weeks | Extracted | Editorially reviewed secondary research | 2026-01-01 | 2026-07-02 | - |
| Statutory weekly hoursavg_weekly_hours | 45 | hours a week | Extracted | statutory_working_time | 2024-01-01 | 2026-06-23 | - |
| Overtime premiumovertime_premium_pct | 50 | % above base pay | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
| State pension ageretirement_age | 60 | years | Statute | National statutes and government sources | 2026-09-12 | 2026-09-17 | - |
Where a field is missing from this table, we hold no sourced value for South Africa and publish the gap rather than filling it. Where a statute and a compilation disagree, the statute wins.
Source tiers on this page: Statute is statute or government source · Official is official multilateral compilation · Extracted is machine-extracted, editorially reviewed.
Use these numbers
Free to reuse under CC BY 4.0 with attribution. The full edition, the per-field coverage table, the corrections log and the methodology live on the dataset page.
For what these rules mean in practice, who can employ under them and what hiring there actually costs, read our guide to hiring in South Africa.
Schuchmann, R. (2026). Global Employment Facts (Employ Borderless) [Data set]. Employ Borderless. https://employborderless.com/hiring-intelligence/global-employment-facts/
DOI pending. Until the Zenodo record resolves, cite the canonical URL above. Cite the dataset, not this page: the edition is frozen, so the numbers above will still be these numbers next quarter.