Most studies that explore the impact of relative standing on subjective well-being use objective measures of the individual’s relative position, such as the mean income of the reference group or the individual’s ranking in the relevant income distribution. In this paper, using a...

In this paper we explore the relationship between English language proficiency and earnings in South Africa, using new data from the first wave of the National Income Dynamics panel survey of 2008. Much of the literature on this topic has studied the impact on earnings of host country language...

This study explores the nature of the marital earnings premium for African men in South Africa using the September 2004 Labour Force Survey and the Labour Force Survey Panel (2001 - 2004). We show that a robust and positive premium to marriage in cross-sectional estimations is substantially...

Studies of the wage effects of unions in South Africa have been concerned largely with the impact of union membership on the wages of African and White male workers. Consistent with findings in the international literature, these studies have concluded that unions compress the distribution of...

In South Africa, marriage rates among white women aged 20 to 34 are at least twice as high as marriage rates among African women in the same age cohort. This paper compares the relationship between alternative definitions of sex ratios and marriage outcomes among African and white women using...

In household surveys, earnings data typically can be reported as point values, in brackets or as 'missing'. In this paper we consider South African household survey data that contain these three sets of responses. In particular, we examine whether there are systematic differences between the...

This paper explores the equity implications of indirect or consumption taxes from a gender perspective, using detailed expenditure data for South Africa. While a growing literature on the incidence of indirect taxes investigates their impact on the income distribution in developing countries,...

This study investigates whether trends in the extent, depth and severity of poverty in South Africa over the past decade have been gendered. We examine first whether females are more likely to live in poor households than males, and whether this has changed over time; and, second, how poverty has...

In this paper, we revisit 'what and who' is middle class in South Africa using data collected in the 2008 National Income Dynamics Study. First we consider how to identify the middle class based on two broad definitions adopted in the international literature: a middle class defined by the...

In this paper, we investigate female part-time employment in South Africa. Using household survey data for South Africa from 1995 to 2004, we show that women are over-represented in part-time employment, and that the growth in part-time work has been an important feature of the feminisation of...