Abstract:
Financial exclusion has been shown to have negative socioeconomic
effects on citizens, especially at the bottom of the
economic pyramid. South Africa suffers from high levels of
financial exclusion, disproportionately at the bottom of the
pyramid. This study investigates nine factors identified from the
literature as being positively associated with financial exclusion
using a logistic regression model. The findings show that the most
significant factors associated with being financially excluded at
the bottom of the pyramid in South Africa were educational level,
primary source of income, age, home language and number of
dependents. The study further found that gender, relationship
status and home ownership were not associated with being
financially excluded. An interesting finding was that living in a
rural area as opposed to an urban area was not significantly
associated with being excluded. The findings and their
implications for expanding financial inclusion at the bottom of the
pyramid are discussed
