# This is who is paying tax in South Africa

- Link: https://dearsouthafrica.co.za/2020/06/07/this-is-who-is-paying-tax-in-south-africa/
- Published: 2020-06-07T12:52:29+02:00
- Author: dearSA

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191034/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T124255.184.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T124255.184")

Finance minister Tito Mboweni has published new data on how South Africa’s tax statistics
have changed over the last five years.

Responding as part of a written parliamentary Q&A, Mbonweni’s data indicates that
there has been a clear decrease in persons submitting Personal Income Tax (PIT) 
while the number of Corporates submitting returns (CIT) has increased.

Despite this shift, provisional tax data published by SARS in April shows that Personal
Income Tax (PIT) is still a key source of revenue.

In 2019/2020 the revenue collector collected a gross amount of R1.6 trillion, which
was offset by refunds of R291.9 billion, resulting in net collections of R1.35 trillion.

This represents growth of R68.2 billion (5.3%) against the 2018/19 financial year,
the revenue collector said.

SARS noted that the main sources of revenue that contributed to the R1.35 trillion
collected were:

 * Personal Income Tax (PIT) contributed R528.9 billion (39%);
 * Value-Added Tax (VAT) contributing R346.6 billion (25.6%);
 * Company Income Tax (CIT), contributed R214.7 billion (15.8%);
 * Customs duties contributed R55.4 billion (4.1%).

The below table, provided by Mboweni, shows the total number of persons who submitted
personal tax returns in each of the past five tax years.

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191033/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T124540.991.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T124540.991")

The below table shows the total amount of tax paid by personal taxpayers in each
of the last five tax years.

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191033/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T124639.334.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T124639.334")

The final tables show the total number of companies that submitted corporate tax
returns in each of the past five tax years and the total amount of tax paid by corporate
entities in each specified tax year.

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191033/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T124732.805.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T124732.805")

**Demographics**

South Africa’s annual tax statistics published at the end of 2019 also provides 
interesting data on who is paying South Africa’s Personal Income Tax.

SARS’ data shows that:

 * 2,680,449 (54.5%) of assessed taxpayers were male taxpayers; 2,236,580 (45.5%)
   were female;
 * 1,342,511 (27.3%) of assessed taxpayers were aged 35 to 44 years; and
 * 1,976,674 (40.2%) of assessed taxpayers were registered in Gauteng, of which 
   636,460 lived in the Johannesburg Metro and were taxed on an average taxable 
   income of R446,838.

This graph shows how income tax collection looks distributed geographically:

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191033/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T124830.787.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T124830.787")

This graph shows how income tax collection is distributed between males and females:

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191032/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T124855.700.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T124855.700")

This graph shows how income tax collection is distributed across broad income groups:

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191032/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T125026.880.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T125026.880")

This table shows how income tax collection is distributed across narrow income groups:

![](https://cdn.dearsouthafrica.co.za/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20191032/Screenshot-
2020-06-07T125116.260.png "Screenshot - 2020-06-07T125116.260")

Article by [BusinessTech](https://businesstech.co.za/news/finance/404785/this-is-who-is-paying-tax-in-south-africa/)