White South Africans definitely. Black South Africans I don't know. Some of them could be better off financially but it's a heck of a thing to be treated as if you are a lesser being because of the color of your skin. I guess the answer is yes in regards to the economy, health (maybe, not sure sure on this) , government corruption and a couple other things but no on just the simple act of being treated like a human. Apartheid had to go but just throwing power into the mob was not a good way to do it. I don't have an answer as far as what would have been a better solution.

I left South Africa as a young teen during the collapse of Apartheid. We had a black maid / nanny who lived on our property in housing my parents provided for years. She did a lot of the work raising us as my parents were always at work. She had a daughter a couple years older than me. Years later my mom wrote her a letter to see how she was doing. She was completely destitute begging for money. Her daughter has multiple kids and was hiv positive. Really rough.

I really don't know what the right approach would have been. It's easy to be an armchair quarterback.

No, there were hectic sanctions against South Africa. We wouldn't have been able to do business outside of SA, travel to many countries, take part in the Olympics, etc. Probably would've ended up like Cuba.

Authoritarian governments are similar to economic bubbles (balloons). They push out everything better and then leave a mess when they collapse.

Pretty much everything on GPs list was a problem during apartheid era as well, or caused by it.

There was 30% unemployment in apartheid era?

(Definitely agree with your first paragraph)

It's estimated to have been around 20% [1], but there isn't an official number. The participation rate was lower because non-white people were limited in terms of where they were allowed to go, live and work.

[1] https://www.nber.org/system/files/working_papers/w13167/w131...

(South African here) I think so. It has to be better than living under a state which regards you as something less than human.