新疆城镇反贫困中的失业保障制度安排

随着“八七扶贫攻坚计划”的完成,新疆农村绝对贫困人口问题已基本解决,而城镇贫困人口问题又日趋严重,职工失业型贫困人群已构成新疆城镇贫困阶层的主体。本文分析了新疆失业保障制度与反贫困之间的关系,认为当前新疆失业保障制度主要存在覆盖面窄、区域收支不平衡等问题,从而未能对新疆城镇贫困人口提供充分的保障。因此,只有健全就业机制,完善现有失业保障制度,才能加快新疆城镇反贫困的步伐。     

Poverty in Zambia: Levels,patterns and trends

This article presents the results of the analysis of levels, patterns and trends in the incidence of poverty in Zambia between 1991 and 1998, based on data captured in nationally representative surveys. In 1998, about 73 per cent of the households in Zambia were poor, the majority of which were extremely poor. Most poor households were in rural areas, with wide inter- and intra-provincial and district variations. The incidence of poverty also varied according to employment status and sector, as well as by district, gender, marital status, education and stratum of head of the household. In general, households headed by females, those without any formal education, unpaid family workers, the inactive, the self-employed, and those in agriculture, forestry and fishing recorded the highest incidence of poverty, with those employed in private households being affected the worst. In spite of the general increase in poverty nationally, most rural provinces registered declines while urban areas experienced increases in the incidence of poverty during the period under review. Furthermore, except for the agricultural/forestry, mining and quarrying, and electricity and gas sectors, the incidence of poverty increased in all the other sectors while remaining almost the same in the real estate sector. The direction and magnitude in the incidence of poverty between 1991 and 1998 were also associated with gender, education, employment status, employment sector, and residence of head of the household, as well as size of the household. Based on the analysis, the article strongly recommends revision in the measurement of poverty, investigation of the types of coping strategies adopted by the poor, and the extent to which these impact on the general well-being and productivity of vulnerable households in Zambia. The need for more qualitative data has also been highlighted.     

Labour Market Trends and Structures in ASEAN and the East Asian NIEs

The paper reviews the literature on labour markets in the region with special emphasis on the impact of economic growth and structural change on employment and wages. It deals with labour supply trends, employment creation outside agriculture (especially export orientated industrialization and new high-tech industries), labour absorption in agriculture, wage differentials and the functioning of rural and urban labour markets.
The creation of efficient and equitable labour market institutions and labour market flexibility have emerged as dominant issues in the NIEs. In the ASEAN-4, because of concentration of employment in low productivity and low wage jobs and underutilization of labour, the rate of modern sector labour absorption remains the major policy concern.     

Labour market performance in developing countries: A survey

Malfunctioning of labour markets is often given as a principal explanation of the widespread poverty in developing countries. Open urban unemployment and disguised unemployment in agriculture are generally considered symptoms of the poor performance of the decentralized system of allocation of labour time and skills in these countries.This survey leads us to a much less pessimistic view of labour market performance per se, though obviously imperfections do exist. On the one hand, the shifts of the labour force in response to shifts in demand have been noteworthy and suggest, at an aggregate level, rather impressive performance. On the other, a closer look at open unemployment, disguised unemployment, and other possible types of labour market malfunctions suggests that they may be less serious misallocations than they appear, and that only in part can such misallocations be attributed to poor labour market functioning.Though the labour market is the immediate locus of the problem of low and stagnant incomes of workers at the bottom of the distribution, the evidence suggests no causality in this association. There is no reason to presume that poverty is a manifestation of labour market failure.     

Access to paved roads,gender, and youth unemployment in rural areas: Evidence from sub-Saharan Africa

The poor development of road infrastructure is one of the main obstacles to economic activity and therefore to employment in rural areas of sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). Using cross-sectional data from 31 SSA countries, this study examines, from a gender perspective, the effect of access to paved roads on youth unemployment in rural areas in the region. The seemingly unrelated bivariate probit framework has been adopted in analysing the data. This approach is used for addressing the possible endogeneity bias that occurs when the dependent variable and regressor are both endogenous and binary. The major finding of this study reveals that access to paved roads in rural areas reduces the probability that young people will face unemployment. The aforementioned is more pronounced for young women than for young men. Moreover, the greater the proximity to the road increases, the greater its reducing effect on the probability of young people being unemployed. It is therefore important that the development of road infrastructure in rural areas be at the centre of public policies to address youth unemployment in SSA countries. This will significantly increase women's empowerment, through their participation in the labour market, and the full economic participation of young people.     

Who Participates in Labor-Intensive Public Works in Sub-Saharan Africa? Evidence from Rural Botswana and Kenya

Provision of low-wage menial employment through public works schemes promises to provide low cost targeting of the poor, especially in rural areas where instruments for income transfer are scarce. Findings from survey-based studies in rural Botswana and Kenya show that the working poor are more willing to participate in public works schemes, especially those with few assets and limited access to private income transfers. Access to short-term employment through these schemes appears to improve the net income of the very poor and decrease poverty among the rural poor. The significant number of nonpoor in the schemes, indicates however a need for improving poverty targeting through setting wage rates that closely reflect the labor supply characteristics of the poor in rural labor markets. In addition, these schemes have to be complemented with other income-transfer interventions to ensure that the poor who fail to meet work requirements are not excluded from public assistance.     

Human Resource Underutilization in an Era of Poverty Reduction: An Analysis of Unemployment and Underemployment in Ghana

Abstract: Unemployment is more prevalent in urban than rural Ghana, while underemployment is pervasive in rural Ghana. The paper analyses trends in these two forms of human resource underutilization and examines their major determinants. It is found that a positive association exists between the underemployment rate and the incidence of poverty in specific industries. The data supports the importance of demographics, education and firm sizes as major determinants of unemployment. Furthermore, these factors together with type of employment are the factors influencing underemployment. To reduce the level of unemployment and underemployment, the government should provide support for: (1) growth of private sector firms and informal sector activities; and (2) rural alternatives to agricultural activities. These implications are also relevant to other African countries trying to combat the twin problems of unemployment and underemployment.     

Structure of Sectoral Decomposition of Aggregate Poverty Changes in Cameroon

Abstract: This paper reviews theoretical frameworks for sectoral decomposition and assesses the within‐ and between‐sector contributions to changes in aggregate poverty in Cameroon informed by the Shapley Value decomposition rule. Between 1984 and 1996 poverty remained a rural phenomenon in Cameroon. It became more widespread, deeper and severer in both rural and urban areas, but more so in urban than rural areas. While the within‐sector effects disproportionately accounted for the increase in poverty in the period 1984–96, the between‐sector contributions in both rural and semi‐urban areas played a mitigating role on the worse effects of the increase in poverty. These findings infer the potential positive feedback effects of migration such as remittances, and/or increases in rural consumption expenditure in the face of rural underemployment, as effective strategies used by migrants to lift their families and villages out of the worse effects of poverty. The implication of this interpretation is that decision‐makers need to better understand the factors that push or pull potential migrants. Rural–urban mobility could, therefore, be viewed as a strategy used by households to moderate the worse effects of poverty and a vector of shared growth. The implications for public policy, in terms of open unemployment and associated social and insecurity problems at the receiving end, point to the wisdom of addressing the push‐factors via targeting more in favour of rural areas.     

Rural Nonfarm Activities and Poverty in the Brazilian Northeast

This paper combines two complementary data sets to present a disaggregated spatial profile of poverty in the Brazilian Northeast, and to investigate the importance of nonagricultural activities for its rural dwellers. We present both univariate and multivariate profiles of nonagricultural employment and discuss its determinants. While the main occupational difference between the rural poor and the rural nonpoor in Brazil seems to be the greater reliance of the former on paid agricultural employment (vis-à-vis own cultivation), rather than access to nonagricultural activities, the evidence nevertheless suggests that diversification into this growing sector provides both an important complement to the budgets of the poor, and possibly a self-insurance mechanism against negative shocks. Despite the substantial heterogeneity of the sector, two general findings are robust: returns to education are comparatively high; and location in relation to urban areas is an important determinant of both employment and earnings in rural nonagricultural activities.     

Labour Market Flexibility,Wages and Incomes in Sub‐Saharan Africa in the 1990s

Abstract: This paper provides an overview of how African labour markets have performed in the 1990s. It is argued that the failure of African labour markets to create good paying jobs has resulted in excess labour supply in the form of either open unemployment or a growing self‐employment sector. One explanation for this outcome is a lack of labour market ‘flexibility’ keeping formal sector wages above their equilibrium level and restricting job creation. We identify three attributes of labour market flexibility. First, whether real wages decline over time; secondly, the tendency for wages to adjust in the face of unemployment; and thirdly, the extent of wage differentials between sectors and/or firms of various size. Recent research shows that real wages in Africa during the 1990s may have been more downwardly flexible than previously thought and have been surprisingly responsive to unemployment rates, yet large wage differentials between formal and informal sector firms remain. This third sense of the term ‘inflexibility’ can explain a common factor across diverse African economies — the high income divide between those working in large firms and those not. Those working in the thriving self‐employment sector in Ghana have something in common with the unemployed in South Africa — both have very low income opportunities relative to those in large firms.     

Changing Sources of Household Income,Poverty, and Sectoral Inequality in Sri Lanka, 1990–2006

Comparing dynamic changes in household income and poverty among urban, rural, and estate sectors in Sri Lanka from 1990 to 2006, this study finds that a shift of household income away from farm to nonfarm sources is accompanied by a significant improvement in household income and reduction in poverty, particularly in the rural sector. Major contributing factors are the rise in returns to labor, in general, and educated labor, in particular, due to the development of the nonfarm labor market. Persistently low income among estate households can be explained primarily by the limited availability of nonfarm employment opportunities and the low education levels of working members.     

Why poor people get rich: Kenya 1960–1979

This paper challenges the conventional model underlying much thinking on Kenya which has stressed the extant inequality of assets (including human capital) and the presumed weakness of intersectoral links owing to structural rigidities in the system. On the basis of recent survey data, the authors test their hypothesis that the pattern of growth and distribution in the Kenyan smallholder sector is best understood rather as being the outcome of the complex interaction of rural factor market failure and urban labour market participation. The sources of growth may be distinguished as improved resource allocation, capital formation and innovation, so that the transmission mechanisms from factor market malfunctioning and urban employment onto growth and distribution must be via these three components. The arguments which follow question the orthodox views on such phenomena as urban bias, trickle-down growth, the functions of urban-rural remittances, and the need for land reform.     

Sectoral Wage Rigidities and Labour and Product Market Institutions in the Euro Area

We estimate wage Phillips curve relationships between sectoral wage growth, unemployment and productivity in a country-industry panel of euro area countries. We find that institutional rigidities – such as labour and product market institutions and regulations – limit the adjustment of euro area wages to unemployment, in both upturns and downturns, particularly in manufacturing and, to a lesser extent, in the construction and service sectors. In addition, there are further limitations in the response of wages to changes in unemployment during economic downturns which suggests that euro area wages are also characterised by significant downward wage rigidities, especially in the manufacturing sector. These results are robust to specifications that account for factors that may affect structural unemployment (such as duration-dependent unemployment effects), as well as changes in the skill composition of employment that may affect the evolution of aggregate wages. The results also hold for panels including or excluding the public sector (where wages may be determined differently to the private sector also due to the effects of fiscal consolidation on public sector wages during the crisis). From a policy perspective, reforms in product and labour markets which reduce wage rigidities can facilitate employment growth and enhance the rebalancing process in the euro area.     

Employment quality index for the South African labour market

ABSTRACT

While the South African government specifically set targets on job creation in its numerous economic strategies since the economic transition, various local studies examined the levels and trends in labour force, employment and unemployment to evaluate if these targets were met. However, the quality of employment has not been thoroughly examined. This is the first local study that fills the existing research gap by deriving a composite, multidimensional employment quality index by taking 18 indicators from seven dimensions into consideration: wage, work hours and flexibility, employment security, income security, social benefits, skills and participation. Using the 2010–16 Quarterly Labour Force Survey data, the empirical findings indicated that highly educated, white male workers aged at least 35 years, who lived in urban areas of the Western Cape and Gauteng provinces, and were involved in high skilled occupations in the formal, public sector enjoyed significantly better employment quality.     

Is there a trade-off between the employment and wages of unskilled African South Africans?

The possible trade-off between employment and wages has characterised most of South Africa’s labour market debates, particularly with regards to decent wages versus unemployment. In this article we explore the relationship between labour market earnings and the level of employment among African birth cohorts using labour force data from 1997 to 2011. We find that the association between an increase in the proportion of unskilled employed in a birth cohort and earnings is mediated by the sector of employment. While some sectors exhibit the expected negative association, there is a robust positive relationship between the first two quartiles of the earnings distribution within birth cohorts and the proportion of the birth cohort who are employed in unskilled occupations in the manufacturing and trade sectors. Because a range of market forces determine this relationship, further research is needed to unpack the reasons for such varied outcomes in order to better inform the debates on labour market interventions like the proposed National Minimum Wage and to appreciate the potential impact of such policy interventions on wages and employment.     

The Unintended Consequences of Education Policies on South African Participation and Unemployment

In the late 1990s, the South African Department of Education implemented two policies that were meant to reduce the large number of over‐aged learners in the school system: schools were no longer allowed to accept students who were more than two years older than the correct grade age, and students could not be held back more than once in each of four schooling phases. Our analysis uses school administrative data and household survey data to show that these policies coincided with a decrease in school enrolment of at least 400,000 and possibly more than 900,000 learners. These policies appear to have pushed many students into the labour market at earlier ages than was observed for previous generations, which explains much of the sudden increase in labour force participation and unemployment during this period. However, since these individuals would probably have entered the labour market sooner if not for their poor employment prospects, we argue that the resulting increase in unemployment signifies a more accurate reflection of disguised unemployment that already existed in the mid‐1990s rather than a deterioration of labour market conditions.     

The South African labour market, 1995–2015

This study investigates the changes in the South African labour market in the post-apartheid period. While unemployment increased over the 1995–2015 period, employment also increased. Nonetheless, the extent of employment increase is not rapid enough to absorb all net entrants into the labour force, resulting in increasing unemployment, or an employment absorption rate of 65.3%. Unemployment is concentrated in specific demographically and geographically defined groups, most notably Africans, the lowly educated and those aged below 30 years, residing in rural areas in Gauteng. Finally, four worrying findings are observed: youth jobseekers aged below 30 years struggle to find their first job; chronic unemployment is more serious for the relatively older jobseekers (aged 45 years or above) with past work experience; employees working for small, medium and micro enterprises still stagnate at approximately 3.5 million; and jobseekers from the older age cohorts are less likely to actively seek work by enquiring at workplaces and answering job advertisements.     

An analysis of the determinants of labour force participation and unemployment in South Africa's North-West province

This article uses a probit model to estimate the determinants of labour force participation and unemployment in South Africa's North-West province. Data from three surveys are used, namely the 1993 Saldru survey, the 1995 CSS (now Statistics SA) survey and a survey conducted in 1997 by the authors. It finds that gender, location (rural or urban), education level, and family structure and relations are significant determinants of unemployment in the province. Because the North-West is a rural province, the results are indicative of the unemployment challenges in South Africa's rural areas. Thus, unless job creation initiatives have a specific rural and gender (female) bias, rural unemployment in South Africa may not be significantly reduced.     

THE IMPACT OF HIGHLY ACTIVE ANTIRETROVIRAL TREATMENT (HAART) ON EMPLOYMENT IN KHAYELITSHA

This paper examines the impact of highly active antiretroviral treatment (HAART) on labour force participation of people living with HIV/AIDS in Khayelitsha, South Africa. Cox Proportional Hazard Models with stratum effects for three medical clinics, and Accelerated Failure Time Models with individual specific unobserved shared effects (frailty), are estimated for transitions from inactivity to unemployment, and transitions from unemployment into employment, using a longitudinal data set. The findings of this study indicate that HAART leads to greater activity in the labour market, but there was not a strong effect on re-entry into employment.