Page 1 of 15  First: although everyone knows that inequality within countries has been rising, inequality between countries has actually been coming down. This is thanks to sustained growth in emerging markets, which are not as far behind the rich countries as they used to be. Second: in South Africa, inequality has been persistently high – but the composition of inequality has changed.
Inequality among black South Africans has increased since the end of apartheid, so that South Africa’s inequality story is now about class as much as it is about race. Third: people often don’t know where their family fits in South Africa’s income distribution, chiefly because people who are relatively better off often do not realise how much poorer most other South Africans are.