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Publications (15)
– But not without some unintended results
About three years have passed since the South African government introduced the COVID-19 Temporary Employer-Employee Relief Scheme (TERS) in response to the pandemic and associated lockdown regulations. Given the extent of unemployment in South Africa even prior to the pandemic, the policy’s primary...
Working Paper
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– Evidence from South Africa
Wage subsidies served as a dominant labour market policy response around the world to mitigate job losses in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, no causal evidence of their effects exists for developing countries.We use unique panel labour force survey data and exploit a temporary...
Working Paper
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– Evidence from South Africa during the COVID-19 pandemic
Wage subsidies have served as a primary labour market policy used around the world to mitigate job losses in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In South Africa, where unemployment is among the highest globally, the Temporary Employer–Employee Relief Scheme supported millions of workers in a far...
Working Paper
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Microsimulation approaches to studying shocks and social protection in selected developing economies
This paper calculates automatic stabilization in Ghana, South Africa, and Ecuador to explain income cushioning amid income and demand shocks. Fiscal policies within these countries are also stress tested to gauge welfare contingencies and insurance. A discretionary action approach is adopted for...
Are there enough tax payers to generate the revenue needed by governments to reduce poverty? How adequate are the social security arrangements that already exist? Anyone who has started to probe these issues will know that the answers to such questions can be hard to pin down. This is why the...
Technical Note
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This note has set out several data processes that have been undertaken using the income data in dataset(s) that underpin SAMOD. Section 1 describes various data-cleaning steps that were undertaken when preparing the LCS 2014/15 as an underpinning dataset for SAMOD. Part 2 elaborates on the process...
Book Chapter
This peer-reviewed research is available free of charge. UNU-WIDER believes that research is a global public good and supports Open Access.
– The top-end, labour markets, fiscal redistribution and the persistence of very high inequality
From the book:
Inequality in the Developing World
Income inequality is the result of complex processes with multiple interacting driving forces but understanding those drivers in emerging economies is particularly difficult because of data and analytical challenges. While most middle-income countries produce comprehensive household surveys these...
– Progress on equality thwarted by slow growth and success of top earners
South Africa has the highest rate of measured inequality in the world. Often thought to be a legacy of the apartheid system, inequality in South Africa has stubbornly persisted. South Africa’s position as highest inequality country in the world has not changed Progressive taxation and social...
Working Paper
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We synthesize the findings from several recent papers on South Africa’s very high income inequality. These papers use new datasets—including income tax data—and new empirical methods to investigate the drivers of household income and individual earnings inequality in South Africa. Increased returns...
Working Paper
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The first democratic elections in 1994 brought about the promise for equal opportunity and an overall improvement of living standards for the majority of the South African population. However, 20 years after the democratization of South Africa, levels of inequality remain stubbornly high. The...
Working Paper
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South Africa exhibits extreme levels of income inequality and is ranked as one of the most unequal countries in the world. In order to measure these severe levels of inequality, it matters how we account for the different parts of the income distribution. Although the approach has gained...
Working Paper
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In this paper we identify some of the drivers of changes in the distribution of earnings and earnings inequality in the South African labour market between 2000 and 2014. Although the overall level of earnings inequality between 2000 and 2011 was high and relatively stable, there were nonetheless...
Working Paper
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This paper uses a recent household survey and the CEQ framework to revisit and extend previous research on the impact of fiscal policy on income redistribution, and poverty in South Africa. We find, in accordance with previous research, that direct taxes and cash transfers are overall progressive...
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