Consumption expenditure by general government, which has been driven by countercyclical fiscal policy, in particular on-going spending on the expanded public works programme, which is aimed at labour intensive infrastructure projects. However, under-spending by national, provincial and local governments continued to subtract from growth in capital formation, in particular social infrastructure.
At some level, albeit at non-spectacular growth rates, all of these factors have helped with dealing with the cyclical aspect of unemployment, although since the beginning of the most recent recession, the unemployment rate has risen and hovers above 25 per cent.