South Africa: The Five Plus Project - How Better-Off South Africans Are Helping to Fight Poverty

analysis

In just over a year, 265 South Africans who can afford it have pledged five percent of their taxable income to help alleviate the effects of grinding poverty in which so many fellow citizens are forced to exist. Launched by two UCT academics and inspired by moral philosopher Peter Singer, the Five Plus Project offers those who are willing and able, an opportunity to make a direct and effective difference.

There is a common mantra among some better off South Africans that somehow by simply paying tax they are contributing to the greater wellbeing of society and that this is enough. Often the comment will be followed by the gripe that it not the taxpayer's fault that leaders and government officials squander this public money through nepotism, mismanagement and corruption or that the distribution of lottery funds is often skewed towards the politically connected.

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