Browsing by Subject "Inequality"

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    Development of context-sensitive accessibility indicators: a GIS-based modelling approach for Cape Town
    (2019) Aivinhenyo, Imuentinyan; Zuidgeest, Mark
    Adequate public transport infrastructure and services are essential to facilitate access to basic opportunities, such as jobs, healthcare, education, recreation or shopping, especially in low-income cities where the majority of the low-income population have no access to the car. In the context of transport exclusion and urban poverty, access and accessibility metrics can serve as good indicators for the identification of transport-disadvantaged zones or population groups in a city. In Cape Town, accessibility-based planning is being embraced by the authority as a means of addressing the planning defects of the past apartheid regime, which created a city that is spatially fragmented by race and income levels. Among the agenda outlined in its 5-year Integrated Transport Plan of 2013-2018, is the need to develop a highly integrated public transport network in which all households would have equitable access to the public transport system, especially for the majority of the urban poor who reside in the city outskirts far from major economic centres. Although planning efforts are being made to redeem the defects of the past, there is still the need for tools and indicators to understand the current situation, as well as to further aid planning and decision making about land-use and transport. The objective of this research, therefore, is to develop suitable indicators of accessibility, identify possible spatial and socioeconomic drivers of accessibility and evaluate equity in the distribution of accessibility benefits for various population groups in Cape Town. In the study, transport network data of Cape Town are utilised to develop GIS-based indicators of network access and origin accessibility to various opportunities like jobs, healthcare and education, across various modes of travel. An Access Index measures public transport service presence within a zone, based on route and stops availability. The index is used to compare the coverage levels provided by each mode of public transport in the city. Also, an Accessibility Index is proposed, that measures the number of opportunities 'potentially reachable' within a specified 'reasonable’ travel time. A key consideration in measuring accessibility by public transport is the monetary cost of overcoming distance, based on the pricing structure that exists in Cape Town. Equity in accessibility is further evaluated both vertically and horizontally. Vertical equity is evaluated using a proposed Accessibility Loss Index, which analyses the potential implication of affordability and budget restrictions on accessibility, based on the income level of the poor households. GINI type of measures is also proposed to evaluate horizontal equity across the various population groups for various travel modes. To further understand the likely drivers of accessibility, an exploratory OLS regression technique is employed to investigate the relationship between accessibility and a combination of socioeconomic and built environment features of the study area. The study reveals among other things that potential accessibility achievable by car is far higher than that achievable by public transport. The paratransit mode provides the most extensive access coverage, and the highest level of accessibility among all the public transport modes investigated. However, this mode shows to be one of the most expensive options of travel, especially for low-income households who are likely to be restricted by travel monetary budgets. The train turns out to be the most affordable travel option, although the level of accessibility achievable with the train is much lower compared to the paratransit or regular bus. From a vertical equity perspective, the consideration of transport affordability drastically reduces the opportunity space and potential accessibility for the poorest population group compared to the higher income groups. The study further interrogates the distance-based tariff model of public transport services in Cape Town, which it considered to be detrimental to the welfare of poor households, regarding the potential to access essential opportunities. The contribution of this study to the body of research on accessibility is twofold: methodological and contextual. On the methodological dimension, it presents a GIS based approach of modelling accessibility both for the car and for a multimodal public transport system that combines four modes; bus, train, BRT and a minibus taxi (paratransit). It also builds on existing gravity-based potential accessibility measure by incorporating an affordability dimension. The consideration of affordability adds a further layer that enables vertical equity evaluation by judging the potential for destination reachability by the monetary out-of-pocket cost of travel. This approach is considered to be more sensitive to the context of low-income cities like Cape Town, where low-income household’s daily travel decisions are likely to be more guided by monetary cost.
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    Distance as a barrier to health care access in South Africa
    (2015-05-28) McLaren, Zoe; Ardington, Cally; Leibbrandt, Murray
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    Distance decay and persistent health care disparities in South Africa
    (2014-11-04) McLaren, Zoë M; Ardington, Cally; Leibbrandt, Murray
    Abstract Background Access to health care is a particular concern given the important role of poor access in perpetuating poverty and inequality. South Africa’s apartheid history leaves large racial disparities in access despite post-apartheid health policy to increase the number of health facilities, even in remote rural areas. However, even when health services are provided free of charge, monetary and time costs of travel to a local clinic may pose a significant barrier for vulnerable segments of the population, leading to overall poorer health. Methods Using newly available health care utilization data from the first nationally representative panel survey in South Africa, together with administrative geographic data from the Department of Health, we use graphical and multivariate regression analysis to investigate the role of distance to the nearest facility on the likelihood of having a health consultation or an attended birth. Results Ninety percent of South Africans live within 7 km of the nearest public clinic, and two-thirds live less than 2 km away. However, 14% of Black African adults live more than 5 km from the nearest facility, compared to only 4% of Whites, and they are 16 percentage points less likely to report a recent health consultation (p < 0.01) and 47 percentage points less likely to use private facilities (p < 0.01). Respondents in the poorest income quintiles live 0.5 to 0.75 km further from the nearest health facility (p < 0.01). Racial differentials in the likelihood of having a health consultation or an attended birth persist even after controlling for confounders. Conclusions Our results have two policy implications: minimizing the distance that poor South Africans must travel to obtain health care and improving the quality of care provided in poorer areas will reduce inequality. Much has been done to redress disparities in South Africa since the end of apartheid but progress is still needed to achieve equity in health care access.
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    Education and inequality: The South African case
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Branson, Nicola; Garlick, Julia; Lam, David; Leibbrandt, Murray
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    Educational inheritance and the distribution of occupations: Evidence from South Africa
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Keswell, Malcolm; Girdwood, Sarah; Leibbrandt, Murray
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    Ethnic Solidarity and the Individual Determinants of Ethnic Identification
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Bossuroy, T.
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    Explaining changes in post-apartheid income and earnings inequality
    (2021) Hundenborn, Ines Janina; Leibbrandt, Murray; Woolard, Ingrid
    This doctoral thesis analyses the changes in income inequality in post-apartheid South Africa. The thesis adds to the existing literature by explaining the underlying causes of the changes in observed income inequality. As such, this thesis applies different decomposition methods to the Gini coefficient. In the analysis of household income sources, traditional static decompositions are supplemented by applying micro-simulations that allow for a dynamic decomposition of changes in income sources reported in household surveys. The results corroborate previous findings of the significant contribution of labour market incomes and governmen grants. However, the application of advanced dynamic methods highlights the effects of changes in other factors, such as investment income and the role of employed household members, which have previously received less attention. Further study of household survey data and a unique set of tax administration data enabled a decomposition of the Gini coefficient of taxable income to investigate the effect of high earners on income inequality and the accuracy of capturing them in household surveys. This analysis highlights a significant weighting issues of high earners in the latest wave of the household survey data. Therefore, when combining the two types of data sets, a significant decrease in overall inequality of taxable income can be found between 2011 and 2014. The results ascertain the vast differences between the top and the bottom of the income distribution and concrete policies addressing both sides of the issue need to be implemented in order to overcome persisting income inequality. Finally, the strong effects of labour market incomes on overall income inequality warrant further investigation. Therefore, changes in earnings inequality are decomposed to assess the effect of changes in the labour market. The application of micro-simulations thereby allows to decompose the changes in earnings inequality into ‘price effect' and ‘endowment effect' but also to assess the effect of changes in labour market participation, employment, occupational structure and unobserved characteristics. The results show that key drivers of an increase in earnings inequality between 1993 and 2012 were changes in the endowments of working age individuals. This effect was partially counteracted by the price effect. The findings show persisting discrepancies between male and female employment in the labour market and the ongoing marginalization particularly of African women which highlights the need for a revision of existing affirmative action laws and their implementation. The National Development Plan offers several strategies for more inclusive growth for South Africa, however, government is already falling behind with its implementation. Therefore, policy makers need to re-examine the efficiency of current social spending and labour laws in order to set the right growth path for the South African economy. The methods utilized throughout this thesis harmonise different sources of information and enable an integrated analysis of the dynamics of the South African income distribution. The static and dynamic decompositions make use of the 1993 household survey of the Project for Statistics on Living Standards and Development (PSLSD) and the 2008 and 2014 National Income Dynamics Study (NIDS). The assessment of high earners is performed by comparing tax administration data provided by the South African Revenue Service (SARS) for the 2010 and 2014 tax years with household survey data from NIDS in 2011 and 2014. Finally, the decomposition of earnings inequality is carried out using data sets from the Post-Apartheid Labour Market Series (PALMS) between 1993 and 2012.
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    Income inequality after apartheid
    (CSSR and SALDRU, 2015-05-28) Seekings, Jeremy; Leibbrandt, Murray; Nattrass, Nicoli
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    Income mobility in a high-inequality society: Evidence from the first two waves of NIDS
    (Development Southern Africa, 2015-05-28) Finn, Arden; Leibbrandt, Murray; Levinsohn, James
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    Inequality and Diversity in Cape Town: An Introduction and User's Guide to the 2005 Cape Area Study
    (2005) Seekings, Jeremy; Jooste, Tracy; Langer, Mirah; Maughan-Brown, Brendan
    The 2005 Cape Area Study comprises a survey of aspects of diversity and inequality in the South African city of Cape Town. The survey was designed as both part of an ongoing study of Cape Town (that includes a series of surveys) and part of an international, multi-city study of aspects of urban life. This report provides an introduction to the survey for prospective users as well as important information for actual users, for example details of sample design and fieldwork.
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    Inequality traps and human capital accumulation in South Africa
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Pellicer, Miquel; Ranchhod, Vimal
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    Inequality, Social Sanctions and Cooperation within South African Fishing
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Visser, Martine; Burns, Justine
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    Information, mobilization, and demand for redistribution: A survey experiment in South Africa
    (2015-05-28) Pellicer, Miquel; Piraino, Patrizio; Wegner, Eva
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    Measuring recent changes in South African inequality and poverty using 1996 and 2001 census data
    (CSSR and SALDRU, 2015-05-28) Leibbrandt, Murray; Poswell, Laura; Naidoo, Pranushka; Welch, Matthew; Woolard, Ingrid
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    Non-monetary dimensions of well-being: A comment
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Wittenberg, Martin
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    Poverty and inequality after apartheid
    (2007) Seekings, Jeremy
    Democratic South Africa was born amidst high hopes for the reduction of income poverty and inequality from their high levels under apartheid. The reality has been disappointing: despite steady economic growth, income poverty probably rose in the late 1990s before a muted decline in the early 2000s, income inequality has probably grown, and life expectancy has declined. The proximate causes are clear: persistent unemployment and low demand for unskilled labour, strong demand for skilled labour, an unequal education system, and a social safety net that is unusually widespread but nonetheless has large holes. It is also clear that economic growth alone will not reduce poverty or inequality. Pro-poor social policies are important, but not as important as a pro-poor economic growth path. Unfortunately, there is little sign of the political conditions changing to push the state towards the promotion of a more pro-poor pattern of economic growth. There is some chance of parametric reforms of the welfare state. Overall, however, it is likely that, after another ten years of democracy, unemployment and poverty rates will remain high, despite significant redistribution through cash transfers, and incomes will continue to be distributed extremely unequally.
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    Social stratification and inequality in South Africa at the end of Apartheid
    (2003) Seekings, Jeremy
    This paper initiates the project of mapping the class structure of South Africa at the end of the apartheid era. The theoretical bases of class in the advanced industrialised societies of the North are revised to render them more appropriate for South African conditions. This entails emphasising not only the differences between employers and employees and those between working people in service relationships and those with labour contracts, but also the differences between those with formal labour contracts and those who sell their labour on a more informal basis. Data from household surveys is used to construct several alternative but crude class categories. It is shown that there are strong correlations between class and income, children’s schooling and aspects of health. Further research is required to demonstrate that class is – or is not – consequential in a range of other respects.
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    The policies for reducing income inequality and poverty in South Africa
    (Southern Africa Labour and Development Research Unit, 2015-05-28) Leibbrandt, Murray; Wegner, Eva; Finn, Arden
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    The sensitivity of estimates of post- apartheid changes in South African poverty and inequality to key data imputations
    (CSSR and SALDRU, 2015-05-28) Ardington, Cally; Lam, David; Leibbrandt, Murray; Welch, Matthew
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