The release of the National Income Dynamics Study Wave 2 provides the first nationally representative longitudinal data collected in South Africa, making it possible to study transitions in and out of school, across grades and into work, in ways not previously possible. We illustrate the high...

Following the international literature, income inequality decompositions on data from contemporary South Africa show that the labour market is the key driver of overall household inequality. In order to understand one of the channels driving this labour market inequality, we use national...

Rapid increases in educational attainment and the massification of secondary education in South Africa resulted in substantial differences in the supply and quality of educated workers across generations. This paper describes changes in the distribution of education across birth cohorts and how...

Differential education expenditure by racial group was a pillar in the architecture of apartheid. School systems diverged by racial group, with large funding and curriculum differences (Fiske and Ladd, 2004). In 1994, spending on white learners was about 1.5 times the spending on urban African...

Education is a major focus of attention in the National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS). With the release of Wave 2 NIDS provides the first longitudinal data ever collected on education in a national household survey in South Africa. This makes it possible to study transitions in and out of school...

This paper analyzes the impact of high school household income and scholastic ability on post-secondary enrollment in South Africa. Using longitudinal data from the Cape Area Panel Study (CAPS), we analyze the large racial gaps in the proportion of high school graduates who enroll in university...

Teenage childbearing is considered a social problem with costs to the teenage mother, her child and society at large. In South Africa, media attention suggests a contemporary crisis in teen childbearing; often linking this to a fear that the Child Support Grant incentivises motherhood among...

This paper constructs a 'synthetic panel' from successive years of the October Household Surveys and Labour Force Surveys, and shows that new insights into the South African labour market are revealed when groups of individuals, defined by their date of birth, are followed from 1995 to 2004....

In the absence of South African longitudinal data for the ten years post apartheid, national cross-sectional household survey data is frequently used to analyse change over time. When these data are stacked side-by-side however, they reveal inconsistencies both in trends across time and between...

In the absence of established longitudinal panel surveys in South African, national cross-sectional household survey data are frequently used to analyse change. When these data are stacked side-byside, however, inconsistencies both in time trends and between household and person level data are...