Wealth Inequality in South Africa, 1993–2017

Chatterjee, Aroop; Czajka, Léo; Gethin, Amory

doi:10.1093/wber/lhab012

Cited by 38 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…South Africa has become even more unequal in terms of wealth distribution after the end of apartheid (Ngcukaitobi 2021; Chatterjee et al 2022). This is not surprising because there is nothing in liberal theory or practice that explains how wealth convergence is supposed to take place under liberalism.…”

Section: Towards a Just Ecological Political Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

Editor’s Introduction: Retheorizing Ecological Imperialism

Obeng‐Odoom¹

2022

American J Econ Sociol

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The world faces a novel problem. The scale of socio-ecological crises that afflict the earth is unprecedented. According to the latest, most comprehensive assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), these problems are worsening and will continue to do so if not addressed. " [T]here is at least a greater than 50% likelihood that global warming will reach or exceed 1.5°C in the near-term, even for the very low greenhouse gas emissions scenario" (IPCC 2022: 10). The ramifications of this warming are certain, but variegated and uneven. "Regions and people with considerable development constraints have high vulnerability to climatic hazards" (IPCC 2022: 14). These regions of highest exposure are disproportionately located "in West-, Centraland East Africa, South Asia, Central and South America, Small Island Developing States and the Arctic" (IPCC 2022: 14). So, clearly, the most shocking vulnerability can be found "in locations with poverty, governance challenges and limited access to basic services and resources, violent conflict and high levels of climate-sensitive livelihoods (e.g., smallholder farmers, pastoralists, fishing communities)" (IPCC 2022: 14). To date, the number of people estimated to be in these areas is 3.3 to 3.6 billion (IPCC 2022: 14). It is not only people who are at the brink of destruction. A high proportion of plants and animals face extinction as the planet grows warmer (IPCC 2022: 16).

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Section: Towards a Just Ecological Political Economymentioning

confidence: 99%

Editor’s Introduction: Retheorizing Ecological Imperialism

Obeng‐Odoom¹

2022

American J Econ Sociol

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“…More than a quarter century after the formal end of apartheid South Africa remains one of the most economically unequal societies in the world with a Gini coefficient of 0.95 for wealth and 0.68 for income (Statistics South Africa, 2017). This inequality is still largely running along the racial divide because white South Africans clearly dominate the top 10% of wealth distribution, which owns at least 90-95% of all private assets in the country (Orthofer, 2016;Chatterjee et al, 2022). 1 Their share of national wealth is constantly strengthened because white households are also still earning five times more than their black counterparts, according to the 2015 data released by Statistics South Africa in 2017.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Racial capitalism, ruling elite business entanglement and the impasse of black economic empowerment policy in South Africa

Habiyaremye

2022

AJOBE

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The high rate of inequality in South Africa is rooted in colonial dispossession and racial exploitation, and still runs primarily along the racial divide. Policy initiatives taken to redress past economic injustices through the black economic empowerment (BEE) have failed to bring economic transformation. Using the twin lenses of epistemic violence and racial capitalism, this study analyses how entangled interests aimed to co-opt the ruling party elite by the apartheid-era business elite led to the BEE impasse. The pervasiveness of cultural alienation in BEE failure suggests that a shift to restorative justice is necessary to break from the impasse.

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“…Extensive work has been done in South Africa using fiscal incidence analysis. Inchauste & Lustig (2017), Maboshe & Woolard (2018), Chatterjee et al (2021) and Goldman et al (2021) analyse the impact of direct transfers, in-kind transfers and direct and indirect taxes on income inequality. Their results show that direct taxes, direct (cash) transfers and in-kind (goods and services) transfers all reduce the Gini coefficient and thus reduce income inequality.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Fiscal policy and dimensions of inequality in South Africa: A time‐varying coefficient approach

Terblanche,

van Lill,

Hollander

2024

South African J Economics

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South Africa continues to face high inequality levels despite its progressive tax and extensive social protection systems. We compare the dynamic impact of fiscal policy on the distribution of incomes, wages and wealth in South Africa from 1993 to 2019. For this purpose, we use a time‐varying parameter vector autoregression to estimate the impact of direct tax revenue and total transfer spending on three distinct inequality datasets. The analysis of various dimensions of inequality is the main contribution of the paper as the literature typically focuses on income inequality. A second contribution lies in the incorporation of time‐varying effects, which enables the analysis of the changing relationship between fiscal policy and inequality. The results suggest that this relationship is indeed time‐varying and that the impact of direct taxes and transfers differs markedly across the inequality dimensions, both in terms of magnitude and sign. Overall, we find that both transfers and direct taxes have not significantly reduced income, wage or wealth inequality in South Africa.

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Wealth Inequality in South Africa, 1993–2017

Cited by 38 publications

References 22 publications

Editor’s Introduction: Retheorizing Ecological Imperialism

Editor’s Introduction: Retheorizing Ecological Imperialism

Racial capitalism, ruling elite business entanglement and the impasse of black economic empowerment policy in South Africa

Fiscal policy and dimensions of inequality in South Africa: A time‐varying coefficient approach

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