Earnings inequality and unemployment in South Africa

Unemployment and earnings inequality have moved together remarkably closely in South Africa in recent years. This article explores the relationship between unemployment and earnings inequality in South Africa, investigating the extent to which changes in unemployment can account for changes in earnings inequality. Static and dynamic decompositions of earnings inequality by employment status reveal the centrality of unemployment in accounting for the both level and trend of earnings inequality. The distribution of employment in the formal and informal sectors is found to be of lesser importance in explaining earnings inequality, as is wage dispersion within each of these categories. The findings point to the central importance of reducing unemployment in South Africa if the extremely high levels of inequality are to be reduced.     

Inflation and growth in South Africa

This paper studies the relationship between inflation and growthin South Africa. Two main issues are addressed: do tests ofthe South African data support the findings of cross-sectionstudies that inflation has a negative effect on growth overthe longer term? and, can higher growth be gained at the costof higher inflation in the short run? The findings are thatinflation drags down growth in South Africa over the longerterm, and that, in the short run, growth above its trend requiresaccelerating inflation. Thus, for growth to be pulled substantiallyabove its present low trend, inflation targeting in South Africawould have to be abandoned. However, this would be counterproductiveover the longer term, once the negative relationship betweeninflation and growth manifests itself.     

Production Efficiency in the South African Banking Sector: A Stochastic Analysis

Econometric estimates of the level of efficiency at bank branches are likely to provide detailed insight into the overall level of efficiency in banking. Therefore this paper uses Bayesian stochastic frontier analysis to assess the production efficiency of 61 bank branches in the nine provinces of the Republic of South Africa. We find that every branch is operating at increasing returns to scale and that the level of production efficiency of bank branches is lower than it could be. We also find that at current levels of output, on average, bank branches can reduce their costs by about 17% if they improve the level of efficiency. In addition, we find that Gauteng Province has the lowest average level of returns to scale, while the Free State Province has the highest average level of the nine provinces. In addition, via estimates of the posterior mean for shares and price elasticities, we find that the price of capital is the largest predicted proportion of costs. These findings suggest that bank branches could also obtain cost reductions by increasing the level of output. Regulatory policy reforms and competitive incentives to enable banks to meet this objective should be encouraged.     

Conspicuous consumption and “race”: Evidence from South Africa

A century ago, Thorstein Veblen introduced socially contingent consumption into the economic literature. This paper complements the scarce empirical literature by testing his conjecture on South African household data and finds that Black and Coloured households spend relatively more on visible consumption than comparable White households. Following the approach of Charles et al. (2009), this paper explores whether the differences in visible expenditures can be explained with a signaling model of status seeking. Moreover, it is assessed to which extent positional concerns motivate conspicuous consumption. Although the socially contingent share in visible consumption increases with income, different incentives to consume conspicuously seem to explain that, at every level of income, Black households spend relatively more on visible consumption than comparable White households. In contrast to the findings of Charles et al. (2009) where differential spending on conspicuous consumption can be found also within each group separately, the model's core hypothesis fails to hold within the group of White South Africans.     

A cost function analysis of import demand and growth in South Africa

This study investigates the substitutability relationships among capital, labor, and imported inputs for South Africa, utilizing the estimates obtained from an aggregate cost function. Our results are consistent with the hypothesis that capital is a substitute for both domestic labor and imports, but that labor and imports are complementary inputs. This latter result suggests that relaxing South African trade restrictions may have a positive impact, in both the long and the short run, on the demand for domestic labor. Other results suggest that the reduction of market impediments may also positively impact the production of investment goods and economic growth.     

Wealth differentiation in household use and trade in non-timber forest products in South Africa

Findings from southern Africa and internationally indicate the local use and trade of NTFPs to be significant however most present a composite picture, failing to account for intra-community socio-economic differences. These differences may have implications for policy and practice related to poverty alleviation and sustainable use. This paper reports on a study in South Africa which explored the relationship between household wealth and the use, procurement and sale of NTFPs in two villages. There was no influence of wealth on the proportion of households using or purchasing most of the NTFPs, or the number used. However, wealthier households bought significantly more resources per household, and poor households (at one village) sold significantly more. These results are discussed within the context of local conditions and poverty alleviation debates.     

南非基础研究经费投入格局和近期出台的计划与举措

2014年5月南非新一届内阁成立,其新任科技部长宣布将在未来5年内实现RD占GDP比重为1.5%的目标,显示出南非科技投入将进入一个新的历史阶段。南非基础研究投入一直处于稳步增长态势,其政府是主要投入力量。近年来,南非针对基础研究出台了一系列的相关战略、计划与措施,如:加大对大科学计划的支持;出台了生物经济战略;加强对科学基础设施建设的规划;扩大卓越中心建设,提升基础研发能力;大力吸引科技人才,加强科研领军人才队伍建设等。期望通过对南非基础研究投入的发展和格局变化的介绍,以及对南非政府出台的相关政策措施的分析研究,对我国依靠创新驱动和提高基础研究能力具有一定的借鉴意义。     

南非突发电力短缺危机及其应对措施

2008年1月中下旬,南非突然爆发电力短缺危机,各界为之震动.本文简要介绍了此次危机的情况,解析了危机发生的原因,阐述了南非政府为应对此次突发电力短缺危机所采取的各项措施,并提出了相关建议.     

Involuntary excess reserves,the reserve requirements and credit rationing in China

Using a sample of 95 banks that covers the period 2000–2011, this article examines Chinese banks’ credit lending behaviour in response to the changes in the reserve requirement ratio in the presence of involuntary excess reserves (IERs) in the banking system. The study finds that Chinese banks with positive IERs one period after a reserve requirement shock experience a significantly increased credit supply in response to an increase in reserve requirement ratio. However, the reserve requirements have no significant impact on the credit supply in Chinese banks that have negative IERs one period after a reserve requirement shock. This article sheds lights on the effectiveness of Chinese monetary policy, which uses reserve requirements as the primary tool to sterilize excess liquidity and restrain credit expansion.     

南非政府科研资助战略服务于知识经济建设

本文介绍分析了南非国家研究基金会2008—2015年愿景（战略规划）。今后7年,南政府科研资助将实现从需求驱动型向战略推动型的功能性重大转变,以促进本国向知识经济转型。值得我们借鉴的如建设具备国际竞争力的科技创新体系、保持世界级的科研工作声誉和经费资助体系、加强前沿科技和创新平台建设等方面。     

The Real Equilibrium South African Rand/US Dollar Exchange Rate: A Comparison of Alternative Measures

This article indicates how different measures of the real exchange rate, i.e., the exchange rate adapted for cost inflation, price inflation and labour costs, influence the equilibrium view and misalignment of the South African rand/US dollar exchange rate. The approach followed is based on the behavioural equilibrium exchange rate approach by Clark and MacDonald (1998), where the exchange rate is influenced by a number of fundamental and transitory factors. The real equilibrium exchange is estimated by using a single equation regression and a number of key explanatory variables. To determine the long-run relationship a Vector Error Correction Mechanism is used.     

南非农业领域研发政策最新动向研究

本文对南非政府近期推出的最新农业领域研发政策进行了研究。在新政策中,南非改革了原有国家农业研发体系,设定了农业研发重点领域,并提出了新的研发资助机制。本文还对南非政府的新举动做了分析与思考,并提出相关建议。     

合伙企业的信任问题分析

合伙企业作为私营企业的一部分,虽规模小但在地方经济发展中不可或缺,对于活跃地方经济,启动民间投资有重 要意义,然而有关合伙企业的研究较少。本文从合伙企业的运行环境和构成特点出发,对合伙人间的信任关系框架进行简要 分析,以说明信任危机产生的来源。最后针对常见的信任问题提出几点建议。     

Product mix,transactions and cost behaviour: a study of South African bank branches

This paper utilizes microeconomic theory and a panel data set to assess the impact of product mix and transactions on cost behaviour of bank branches in South Africa over the short and long‐term. Estimates of properties of concavity and monotonocity indicate that the cost functions of typical bank branches in South Africa are neither consistent with short‐term nor long‐term cost‐minimizing behaviour. This corroborates earlier findings which indicate that South African banks have low production efficiency and high market power. In addition the cost functions and two production‐output type indices indicate that overall, the intermediation‐output type mix (foreign exchange and custodial services) has a more significant effect on cost behaviour than the production‐output type mix (cheque and deposit accounts). The variety of production‐output type services provided by a branch appears to have limited effect on costs. However the financial value of production‐output type transactions has an impact on costs while the financial value of intermediation type products does not. Branches that provide intermediation‐output type products tend to have higher variable costs – the key determinant of costs is the number of transactions.     

South Africa's post-apartheid microcredit experiment: moving from state-enforced to market-enforced exploitation

The international donor community arrived in post-apartheid South Africa in the early 1990s to restructure the economy along neoliberal lines. One of the most important of the interventions it promoted was microcredit, which was widely seen as one of the principal self-help solutions to the exceptionally high levels of unemployment and poverty that prevailed in the Black South African community. In spite of an early ‘boom-to-bust’ episode in the early 2000s and worrying evidence it was actually further impoverishing far more Black South African's than it was actually helping escape from poverty and unemployment, the microcredit model did not lose its international support: if anything, this support was expanded as the international development community desperately sought to ensure the survival of the microcredit model and therefore also the centrality of self-help and individual entrepreneurship as the only way out of poverty for the poor. This article shows how and why the microcredit model was supported so strongly by the international development community and South African financial community in spite of its manifestly calamitous impact on Black South African community. Overall, I conclude, microcredit can be viewed as South Africa's own sub-prime-style disaster which, like the original US version, has mainly served to benefit a tiny financial elite working within and around the microcredit sector, whilst simultaneously destroying many of the most important pillars of the economy and society.     

个人信用征信与保护的冲突与平衡

个人征信行业和制度的发展是市场经济发展的必然,是市场交易安全的保障,其本质要求个人信用信息的开放和共享,而个人信用信息的私密性的特征决定了个人信用征信机制的构建与个人隐私权保护的冲突不可避免。可以说,个人信用隐私权的适度限制与个人征信信息的适当公开,二者的平衡与协调是个人征信体系建立成败的关键问题。在个人信用信息的征集、管理及使用过程中,都应注重个人信用信息保护的平衡。     

Persistent poverty and informal credit

This paper explores the consequences of nonlinear wealth dynamics for the formation of bilateral credit arrangements to help manage idiosyncratic risk. Using original data on expected wealth dynamics, social networks and informal loans among southern Ethiopian pastoralist households, we find that the threshold at which expected wealth dynamics bifurcate serves as a focal point at which lending is concentrated. Informal lending responds to recipients' losses but only so long as the recipients are not “too poor”. Our results suggest that when shocks can have long term effects, loans are best understood as providing a safety net rather than a scale-neutral insurance mechanism. Furthermore, the persistently poor are excluded from social networks that are necessary to obtain loans given in response to shocks.     

Excess liquidity and credit misallocation: evidence from China

China’s M2/GDP ratio continues to rise despite having reached the highest tier in the world, but there is no consensus on its driving forces. In this paper, we investigate this puzzle empirically, using different levels of data. We first estimate the degree of the excess liquidity in China based on cross-country regressions. Our results show that China’s excess liquidity is 50 percent of that implied by the cross-country benchmark. Province-level evidence shows that credit misallocation between state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and private enterprises (PEs) may lead to credit inefficiency and hence generate excess liquidity. We further validate this finding using manufacturing firm-level data, and show that credit misallocation has deteriorated since the Four Trillion Yuan Stimulus Plan since 2008. These facts unveil more challenges for the ongoing deleveraging campaign and SOE reform..