Not to detract from your root question, but it's worth being accurate with the numbers. The number of individual tax payers is 7.6 million, not 4 million. There

Not to detract from your root question, but it's worth being accurate with the numbers. The number of individual tax payers is 7.6 million, not 4 million. There is also company taxes on top of that [1]. But that's not the whole picture. You also have to take into account non-personal taxes like VAT, booze, smokes, sugar and petrol to name but a few. These are significant revenue sources, and ultimately tax low-income people fairly harshly. So to say 4 million people are paying for everyone else is an over simplification. I'll comment on your main question in another post. [1] https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-10-28-crunch-the-numbers-the-tax-base-is-not-dwindling/ https://www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2019-10-28-crunch-th...