International conference: UNU-WIDER and National Treasury Conference

South Africa - 21 November 2017

Title: Exporting, wages and wage inequality in South Africa
Author(s): Bezuidenhout, C., Matthee, M. & Rankin, N.A.

Abstract:
This paper contributes to the understanding of the linkages between exporting, labour demand and wages in South Africa. It disentangles labour market differences between exporters and non-exporters and finds that exporters employ more people and pay higher wages. Given these higher wages the paper investigates how this wage premium is distributed within the exporting firm. There appears to be a wide dispersion of wages among exporters (particularly international/non-African exporters). However, almost all of that dispersion (particularly among continuing exporters) is explained by the labour productivity and size of these firms. This suggests that there is thus a large degree of dispersion of these variables for these firm groups (relative to non-exporters). Wage inequality among exporters is not driven by exporting but rather by characteristics associated with the types of firms that participate in the export market.

Author