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Wage effects of unions and industrial councils in South Africa

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  • Butcher, Kristin F.
  • Rouse, Cecilia Elena

Abstract

In South Africa, unions which played a crucial in the country's transition from apartheid, are coming under fire. Some argue that a high union wage premium, and the industrial council system are important causes of inflexibility in South Africa's labor market. The authors analyze unions'direct effect on workers'wages (including the time-honored question about whether the union wage gap is real, or reflects the fact that workers who are members of unions, differ from those who are not), and ask whether there is evidence that industrial council agreements force affected employers to pay union wages for non-union workers. Theyestimate that among Africans, union members earn about twenty percent more than non-members, while among whites, union workers earn ten percent more than non-union workers. They find that African non-union workers, who are covered by industrial council agreements, receive a premium of six to 10 percent; the premium is positive, but not statistically significant for whites. In addition, the union gap is smaller inside the industrial council system, than outside the system for Africans, implying that the total union premium for union members covered by an industrial council agreement, is similar to the union premium outside the industrial council system. Among Africans, the industrial council, and union wage gaps, are greatest among low-wage workers. To increase employment, policies in South Africa should focus on increasing competition among employers within sectors, rather than increasing competition among workers, by trying to reduce union power.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by The World Bank in its series Policy Research Working Paper Series with number 2520.

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Date of creation: 31 Jan 2001
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Handle: RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:2520

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Keywords: Health Monitoring&Evaluation; Labor Management and Relations; Environmental Economics&Policies; Labor Standards; Geographical Information Systems;

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References

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  1. Schultz, T.P. & Mwabu, G., 1997. "Labor Unions and the Distribution of Wages and Employment in South Africa," Papers 776, Yale - Economic Growth Center.
  2. Moll, Peter, 1996. "Compulsory Centralization of Collective Bargaining in South Africa," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 86(2), pages 326-29, May.
  3. Stephan Klasen & Ingrid Woolard, 1999. "Levels, trends and consistency of employment and unemployment figures in South Africa," Development Southern Africa, Taylor and Francis Journals, vol. 16(1), pages 3-35.
  4. Aigner, Dennis J., 1973. "Regression with a binary independent variable subject to errors of observation," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 1(1), pages 49-59, March.
  5. Rosen, Sherwin, 1969. "Trade Union Power, Threat Effects and the Extent of Organization," Review of Economic Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(106), pages 185-96, April.
  6. Heckman, James J, 1979. "Sample Selection Bias as a Specification Error," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(1), pages 153-61, January.
  7. Harry C. Katz, 1993. "The decentralization of collective bargaining: A literature review and comparative analysis," Industrial and Labor Relations Review, ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 47(1), pages 3-22, October.
  8. Sullivan, Daniel, 1989. "Monopsony Power in the Market for Nurses," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 32(2), pages S135-78, October.
  9. Griliches, Zvi, 1977. "Estimating the Returns to Schooling: Some Econometric Problems," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 45(1), pages 1-22, January.
  10. Halvorsen, Robert & Palmquist, Raymond, 1980. "The Interpretation of Dummy Variables in Semilogarithmic Equations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 70(3), pages 474-75, June.
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Blog mentions

As found by EconAcademics.org, the blog aggregator for Economics research:
  1. To understand earnings in Africa, we need to look past the formal/informal divide
    by Andrew Kerr in The CSAE Blog on 2012-06-01 11:47:25
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Cited by:
  1. Rama, Martin, 2003. "Globalization and workers in developing countries," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2958, The World Bank.
  2. Haroon Bhorat & Carlene van der Westhuizen & Sumayya Goga, 2009. "Analysing Wage Formation in the South African Labour Market: The Role of Bargaining Councils," Working Papers 09135, University of Cape Town, Development Policy Research Unit.
  3. Ozler, Berk, 2007. "Not Separate, Not Equal: Poverty and Inequality in Post-apartheid South Africa," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 55(3), pages 487-529, April.
  4. Francis Teal & Geeta Kingdon & Justin Sandefur, 2005. "Labor Market Flexibility, Wages and Incomes in sub-Saharan Africa in the 1990s," Economics Series Working Papers GPRG-WPS-030, University of Oxford, Department of Economics.
  5. Kingdon, Geeta & Knight, John, 2006. "The measurement of unemployment when unemployment is high," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 13(3), pages 291-315, June.
  6. Carlos Casacuberta & Gabriela Fachola & Nestor Gandelman, 2004. "The Impact of Trade Liberalization on Employment, Capital, and Productivity Dynamics: Evidence from the Uruguayan Manufacturing Sector," Research Department Publications 3170, Inter-American Development Bank, Research Department.
  7. Haroon Bhorat & Sumayya Goga & Carlene Van Der Westhuizen, 2012. "Institutional Wage Effects: Revisiting Union And Bargaining Council Wage Premia In South Africa," South African Journal of Economics, Economic Society of South Africa, vol. 80(3), pages 400-414, 09.
  8. Damian Hattingh & James Hodge & Sandrine Rospabé, 2003. "The Impact of Privatisation and Regulatory Reform on Wage Premia in State-Owned Enterprises in South Africa," Working Papers 03078, University of Cape Town, Development Policy Research Unit.
  9. Azam, Jean-Paul & Rospabe, Sandrine, 2007. "Trade unions vs. statistical discrimination: Theory and application to post-apartheid South Africa," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 84(1), pages 417-444, September.
  10. Paula Armstrong & Janca Steenkamp, 2008. "South African Trade Unions: an Overview for 1995 to 2005," Working Papers 10/2008, Stellenbosch University, Department of Economics.
  11. David Fairris, 2007. "¿Qué hacen los sindicatos en México?," Estudios Económicos, El Colegio de México, Centro de Estudios Económicos, vol. 22(2), pages 185-240.
  12. Martin Rama, 2002. "Mondialisation, inégalités et politiques de l'emploi," Revue d’économie du développement, De Boeck Université, vol. 16(1), pages 43-83.
  13. Bennett, Mark, 2002. "Organizing workers in small enterprises : the experience of the Southern African clothing and textile workers' union," ILO Working Papers 357086, International Labour Organization.
  14. Bennett, M, 2003. "Organizing in the informal economy : a case study of the clothing industry in South Africa," ILO Working Papers 358155, International Labour Organization.
  15. Reza Daniels & Sandrine Rospabé, 2005. "Estimating an Earnings Function from Coarsened Data by an Interval Censored Regression Procedure," Working Papers 05091, University of Cape Town, Development Policy Research Unit.

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