JOHANNESBURG - News headlines scream "rich list", unions shout "unfair", and blame overpaid bosses for South Africa's problems.

Academics talk about the immoral situation on talk shows and blame millionaire bosses and business owners for the country's income inequality. Many also call for a wealth tax.

Unfortunately the information on which this is based on is not only misleading but incorrect.

Statistics South Africa recently launched its second labour market dynamics report which analyses the total labour market in detail.

This report shows that:
� Less than half of South African employers (employers of others) earn R7 900 per month;
� A typical employee earns R2 900 per month;
� A typical self-employed person earns only R1 950 per month.

We have been led to believe that South African bosses (employers) earn about 500 times more than employees, or at least 55 times more.

For employers, the income includes investment income and net earnings they receive. Employees' income includes wages and salaries. The typical employer earns less than three times the income of a typical employee.

This fact - that a typical employer earns three times of that of a typical employee - will not increase entrepreneurship and job creation as the risks and work load are far higher than most people think.

The StatsSA report states that about 1.1m employees earn more than R13 000 per month, but that only 200 000 employers do. The typical government employee gets paid more than the typical employer in South Africa.

Using annual reports and older pay scales for some state-owned enterprises, the facts are even clearer.

Eskom pays its average employee four times more than the median employer. The lucky few who work for the state or for one of its enterprises are often paid much more than employers and certainly far more than the typical self-employed entrepreneur. State employees do not take as much risk as entrepreneurs do.
Even more frightening is the fact that the typical academic gets paid four times the income of the median employer.

The total package a cleaner in government could get rose to a maximum of R96 790 per year in July 2008. In the middle of 2010 the net earnings of the median employer amounted to R94 800 per year. This is R2 000 less than a senior cleaner received two years earlier!

Please hear me when I say that it is madness to believe that all employers earn what the 100 richest earners in the country get, in fact often the top earners are employees themselves. The facts above paint a totally different picture.

I can hear the screams of disbelief from clever folks that this cannot be true. Sensational rich lists which highlight the earnings of the top 100 earners in the country are just NOT a reflection of reality. Analysts should quote them as if though they are.

The Labour Force Survey (LBS) was based on around 120 000 interviews in 2010. Similar statistics are available for 2009. The findings of this survey is corroborated by tax statistics that shows there are fewer than 3 000 people who earn more than R5m a year. Many of these individuals are employees.

The most comprehensive income database in the country - the national tax statistics - shows that fewer than 320 000 or about 1% of our adult population earn more than R500 000 a year (2009/10 tax year).

Using the LFS and other data sources, it is clear that employers constitute fewer than 50 000 of the top 1% of earners in the country. Furthermore, only about 11 000 of people who are self-employed, can count themselves among the top 1%.
There are more employees working for the government and state-owned enterprises among the top 1% of earners in the country, than employers.

The key question is why employees, who take no business risk, are paid more than most employers? Why are many commentators and analysts so ill-informed?

The reality is totally removed from the sensational "evidence" published in newspapers.

We have had lesser evidence repeated as facts before. Remember "facts" like South Africa has the cheapest electricity in the world. This has not been true since 1998.

Silly as it may seem, the facts are that South Africa will not create jobs or get any meaningful growth if we continue to lambast "rich" employers and poor workers, when on real evidence paints a totally different picture.

Did you know that 25% of all employers earn less than R3 000 per month and in many cases they earn less than their employees even as they are the individuals taking all the risks. This often seems to be the case in rural areas.

We need to find ways to make it easier for employers to do their thing and we need to find ways to help them to increase their income. We need to praise them more and give them a louder voice. Give us entrepreneurs room to grow and do not tell them how much more tax they need to pay and how much more they need to contribute.

Fewer than 2% of South Africans employ an employee. Fewer than 4% are self-employed.

There are too few of these heroes. They receive very little support. But they are the only, and I repeat, the only hope for South Africa to create employment and wealth.
They are underpaid for the risk they take. If the median employee gets
R2 900 the old Greek philosophers would have expected the employer to earn R58 000 per month (according to the old 20:1 ratio).

We need to start bringing real evidence to the wealth debate and ignore loud and bloated opinions based on inadequate evidence. News headlines should scream SA loves wealth, jobs and entrepreneurs; not bastards on a rich list. I am sad that this overwhelming evidence of real facts is not presented in the public debate.

Post script: When I first saw the 2009 in the Labour Market Dynamics I held back for a year as I also thought that the data could not be true. I had the public service pay schedules and it did not make sense, but as the tax statistics of 2009 and 2010 also came in and the 2010 Labour Market report came out it become clear to me that this has to be part of the evidence and facts over the superficial debates on wealth, employment and a host of other issues.

*Mike Schssler is an economist and entrepreneur.