The state of the labour market in South Africa after the first decade of democracy

Youth unemployment in South Africa revisited

“…They find that the youth unemployment likelihood is twice that of the non-youth population, despite the fact that this ratio is lower in only five out of 14 sub-Saharan countries for which data are available. Burger & Woolard (2005) compare OHS 1995with LFS 2002 March to investigate the demographic and educational attainment characteristics of the broad labour force and unemployed, as well as the work activities of the employed. They only briefly look at broad unemployment rates of age cohorts, and find that the unemployment rate is the highest in the age 16 to 24 cohort.…”

Revisiting unemployment levels and trends in South Africa since the transition

“…However, unemployment continues to rise as job creation does not match the growing labour supply. Some of these labour force entrants are unemployable due to their low level of education and lack of work experience (Burger & Woolard, 2005). The only study explicitly explaining the rapid increase of unemployment in the OHSs is that by Burger et al (2012).…”

“…In others words, when trade unions and employers negotiate over wage level, the views of the outsiders are not represented (Paton, 4 2011;Von Fintel & Burger, 2009). Furthermore, the labour force with relatively lower levels of educational attainment who failed to find work in the formal sector also struggle to survive in the informal sector, due to the barriers of entry to the sector and the lack of government support to promote microenterprises and informal enterprises (Kingdon & Knight, 2004Rogerson, 2004;Burger & Woolard, 2005;Devey et al, 2006).…”

The South African Labour Market

“…This view is also reflected by Burger and Woolard (2005) and Van der Berg (2011). In order to achieve this goal and provide the solution to the unemployment problem, educational policy needs to be decisive and have long-term benefits and economic growth goals in mind.…”

“…To this end, Kingdon and Knight (2004) state that "the informal sector is not generally a free-entry sector in South Africa, and that there may be barriers which prevent many of the unemployed from entering much of this sector". Burger and Woolard (2005) more specifically cite a lack of infrastructure and inadequate access to credit markets as barriers to entering the informal sector in South Africa.…”