Introduction

According to Worldometers the latest estimations of South Africa’s population ranks 25^th in the list of countries by population with a population of 55 340 863 which is equivalent to 0.74% of the total world population. Only 64.3% of the population is urban, therefore, from 55 340 863 only 35 633 585 of these people are urban. This means that 35.7% of the South African population have limited access to occupations and occupational mobility; there has been no change and no social adaptability because unlike in the city the chance of fast changing life is low. Rural societies have no division of labour because the job opportunities are not those that require specialization, there are very few chances of employment and incentive to the unemployed.

Industry 4.0 is the current trend of automation and data exchange in manufacturing technologies, which includes cyber-physical systems, the internet of things and cloud computing. It creates what is known as a smart factory. The fourth industrial revolution comes with a number of advantages and disadvantages which cater both to the urban and rural areas of a country, however in more ways than one; industry 4.0 comes with many disadvantages to developing nations such as that of South Africa. The introduction of new technological improvements that are brought to improve our lives such as dishwashers, laundry machines, garden appliances, etc. all great for reducing the workload however, these are skills for some people and are their source of income; this factor shows that the introduction of technological advancements reduces employment increasingly as in most cases it seeks to replace the worker with a self-operating machine, the advantage in this case is that the owner of the laundry machine will save money by removing monthly/weekly wages into paying a once-off deal. The occurrence of the gap between the urban and rural populations is induced by the ever increasing and improving technology within the urban area. Urban areas represent development whereas rural areas represent underdevelopment, this imbalance of development and underdevelopment is the main basis of societal division caused by imbalance between the haves and the have-nots.

Conclusion

Increasing unemployment creates a greater gap and economic imbalance within the state; the state will have the responsibility to assist those that are disadvantaged which is a national responsibility, the capital used for social grants are more likely to increase each year which eventually will result in a developing country not having sufficient amount of capital to continuously improve their technology compared to the developed nations. As we all know that technology improves every single day and most developing countries are already behind and hardly catch up, the inability to provide equal distribution of resources results in a societal divide by poverty with regards to economic stability amongst societies.