South Africans are under financial pressure, but many are responding with a new kind of discipline: cutting excess, paying down debt, boosting emergency savings and trying to take more control over their money.
That's the broader picture emerging from a host of recent studies, including Frank's inaugural Wealth Index, TransUnion's latest Consumer Pulse study and new commentary from earned wage access platform Paymeno.
Together, the findings suggest that while income matters, habits may matter more.
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The franc's wealth index, based on responses from 3,952 economically active South Africans, received an average score of only 45 out of 100. To put it bluntly, many houses are neither collapsing nor thriving, but are stuck in an uncomfortable middle.
The report's sharpest conclusion is that behaviors like budgeting, saving regularly, managing debt and planning ahead often outperform age, education and income as predictors of financial well-being.
Dr. Thomas Brennan, co-founder and CEO of Frank, said many people believe that earning more automatically solves money problems.
He said, “What the report showed for me…is the moment you're able to get into habits like saving regularly, tracking your expenses, keeping debt manageable, and developing a financial plan, you see a disproportionate improvement in financial well-being.”
This could be encouraging news in a country where wage growth has been uneven and unemployment remains stubbornly high. This suggests that changes in behavior can have some benefits, even before a major event…