A post-apartheid analysis of intra-racial earnings inequality

Part of the Inequalities Seminar Series

Speaker:
Mlondi Mveli Mdluli, PhD Candidate, University of Reading and Member of Parliament in South Africa

This paper examines the evolution of intra-racial earnings inequality in South Africa between 1993 and 2017, with a particular focus on gender disparities within racial groups. While a substantial body of literature has analysed income inequality in South Africa, most studies focus on differences between racial groups or measure inequality using household income, which combines the earnings of all members of a household. Consequently, almost no attention has been given to the structure of inequality within racial groups using individual labour market earnings, nor to analyses that enable a direct examination of gender disparities within these racial groups.

Using harmonised microdata from the 2019 Post-Apartheid Labour Market Series (PALMS) version 3.3.1 dataset, the analysis examines earnings outcomes for African/Black, Coloured, Indian/Asian, and White workers across four benchmark years: 1993, 2003, 2013, and 2017. Inequality is analysed using kernel density estimation, decomposable measures from the Generalised Entropy (GE) class of inequality indices, and Gini-based subgroup decompositions. Distributional dynamics are further examined using Recentered Influence Function (RIF)–based Oaxaca–Blinder decompositions at the 10th, 50th, and 90th percentiles of the earnings distribution.

The results show that a large share of earnings inequality in South Africa occurs within rather than between racial groups. However, gender disparities remain an important component of intra-racial inequality, with their magnitude varying across the earnings distribution and over time. These findings highlight the importance of examining the intersection of race and gender in order to better understand the structure of labour market inequality in post-apartheid South Africa.

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Host or Publisher LSE International Inequalities Institute