The aim of this study is to provide an analysis of the shifts in non-income welfare that have occurred over the period 1993 to 2004. This analysis serves as a complement to existing research which has focused on shifts in income poverty and inequality in the post-apartheid period. In addition,...

The paper reflects on the findings from a firm survey conducted among twenty of South Africa’s largest firms across a range of sectors. The survey formed part of research conducted by the Development Policy Research Unit on graduate unemployment in South Africa. The firm interviews traversed a...

Abstract: The objective of this study is to provide a comprehensive measure of shifts in welfare in post-apartheid South Africa by examining changes in both income and non-income welfare between 1993 and 2005. Previous research using expenditure or consumption-based measures of income has shown...

South Africa has historically been ranked as one of the most unequal societies in the world and, while the country has experienced sustained positive economic growth since 1994, the impact of this growth on poverty, and particularly inequality, has been disappointing. Analysis using data from...

The post-1994 period in the South African economy is characterised, perhaps most powerfully, by the fact that the economy recorded one of its longest periods of positive economic growth in the country’s history. One of the more vexing issues within the economic policy terrain in post-apartheid...

One of the key interventions aimed at improving the welfare of South African households has been local government’s provision of a package of free basic services (FBS) to poor households. It is, however, not completely clear how different municipalities identify households which are eligible...

The literature on the union wage gap in South Africa is extensive, spanning a range of datasets and methodologies. There is however little consensus on the appropriate method to correct for the endogeneity of union membership or the size of the union wage gap. Furthermore, there are very few...

The role of bargaining councils, the central pillar of collective bargaining in South Africa, in the formation of wages is important in the context of high unemployment rates in South Africa. In this study we find that while institutionalised collective bargaining system covered substantially...

Theory predicts that an increase in employment protection may reduce employment levels by acting as a tax on firms by constraining hiring and firing decisions. We use a unique administrative database of the country’s dispute resolution body – the Commission for Conciliation, Mediation and...

There is consensus among analysts that South Africa’s unemployment is structural in the sense that the unemployed generally possess lower skills than what is required in the marketplace. In the context of increasing demand for skilled workers due to technical progress and the need to become...