Grants

 Policy-related work

Can minimum wages reduce poverty under low compliance?

Review of Political Economy (ROPE), with Vimal Ranchhod, 2024

We study a 50% increase in the minimum wage of South Africa's agricultural sector,  using variation in individual farmworker wages prior to the law. Earnings rose by 9% and poverty decreased by 5 to 7%, with smaller effects for the lowest paid workers explained by endogenous partial compliance. See publication, media piece.


Stimulus effects of government jobs and grants programmes

Commissioned by Project Management Office in the Presidency of South Africa, with Joshua Budlender and Murray Leibbrandt, 2022-2023

We evaluate the local stimulus effects of South Africa's largest public employment programme. We securely track the spending of programme participants at the largest retailer to causally evaluate the increase in sales resulting from employment. We extrapolate local economy effects on employment, wages and value chains. See working paper, media piece.


The impact of COVID-19 in South Africa: Labor market and poverty over 2020

South African Journal of Economics (SAJE), with Joshua Budlender, Rocco Zizzamia and Ronak Jain, 2023

We use newly-released South African data to present the first estimates of COVID-19-related employment and poverty impacts in a developing country. Active employment declines by 40%, and we estimate that 20-33% of job losers fall into poverty. A third of job losers had no access to social protection. See publication, media piece, The Economist.


Exploring the idea that increasing profits is a legitimate operational requirement: Revisiting a 20-year old impulse

South African Law Journal (SALJ), with Bhavna Ramji and Jeremy Phillips, 2023

Is increasing the profits of an already-profitable company an operational requirement for purposes of the Labour Relations Act in South Africa? We demonstrate that the current judicial position unduly favours employers, partly due to economically incorrect assumptions. See publication.


Social distress and (some) relief: Estimating the impact of pandemic job loss on poverty in South Africa

International Journal of Microsimulation (IJM), with Joshua Budlender and Maya Goldman, 2023. 

We present new pandemic poverty estimates for South Africa between 2020 Q1 and 2021 Q4. We improve on much of the microsimulation literature by using observed rather than simulated shocks and allow for uneven impacts of the pandemic by employment sector and demographic characteristics. Related report commissioned by National Treasury of South Africa, With Maya Goldman, Joshua Budlender, Lindi Mzankomo, Murray Leibbrandt and Ingrid Woolard, 2021. We use a fiscal incidence model based on the South African 2014/15 Living Conditions Survey to simulate the poverty reduction impacts of a selection of medium-to-long-term social grant options with the goal of closing the extreme poverty gap. See report.


Exclusive growth: Rapidly increasing top incomes amidst low national growth in South Africa

South African Journal of Economics (SAJE), with Ingrid Woolard, 2020

We use tax data to investigate the patterns of income growth over the period 2003 to 2016. We find that the top 5% of incomes grew at about 5% per year compared to national income growth of about 3.5% per year. This divergence appears to be partially driven by high growth in income from capital. See publication, media piece.