Policy Papers

Policy makers in many countries have perceived plastic-bag littering, its associated waste disposal and consumer behaviour as a cause of environmental problems. It is for this reason that many governments are now taking action. The plastic-bag legislation in South Africa combined elements of...

Given apartheid’s legacy of irrational spatial planning it should be unsurprising that location matters for labour market outcomes. This paper attempts to quantify this effect by introducing a new urbanisation index into standard employment regressions. Utilising a multinomial logit model, it is...

South Africa has very high unemployment, yet few adults work informally in small firms. One potential contributor to this problem is that large firms and unions can extend arbitration agreements to non-unionized smaller firms, raising wages. While local labor market characteristics influence the...

In developing countries, where health insurance is not a commonly purchased financial instrument, recent debates have revolved around extending health insurance coverage to a wider range of the population, primarily via compulsory insurance schemes. However, these debates rarely consider the...

South Africa’s growth experience provides an example of how contrasting growth trends - long-term decline followed by improved growth - pivot around political change, in this case a transition to democracy. In the decade prior to 1994, South Africa experienced the worst period of economic growth...

Tobacco advertising bans have become commonplace in developed nations but are less prevalent in developing countries. The importance of advertising bans as part of comprehensive tobacco control strategies has been emphasised by the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control which calls for...

This paper provides a broad overview of the relationship between infrastructure and growth, focusing on the South African case. The paper develops an intuitive theoretical framework in which to analyse this relationship, identifying five specific channels through which infrastructure may effect...

One of the most visible forms of unemployment is the men who stand at the side of the road or on corners every day, waiting for any job that may come their way. Blaauw, Louw and Schenck (2006) estimated that there are nearly 1000 places in South Africa where people are picked up and a minimum of...

This paper investigates the bias and dispersion in official revisions of eight national accounting growth rates. The growth in GDP, consumption expenditure and personal disposable income by households has been subject to significant upward revisions and bias, especially after 1994. No significant...

This paper examines the importance of courts for trade credit amongst manufacturing firms in the East African community (EAC). The paper finds that high enforcement costs do not deter the use of courts to settle disputes associated with trade credit. The analysis suggests that when courts function...