Youth Employment, Recruitment and a Youth-Targeted Wage Subsidy : Findings from a South African Firm Level Survey
Employment issues are the most serious problems facing South Africa currently. Among these are the problems of unemployment, as well as underemployment or lack of decent work for the already employed, compounded by labour markets that are generally...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2017
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/474161468340302761/Youth-employment-recruitment-and-a-youth-targeted-wage-subsidy-findings-from-a-South-African-firm-level-survey http://hdl.handle.net/10986/27458 |
| Summary: | Employment issues are the most serious
problems facing South Africa currently. Among these are the
problems of unemployment, as well as underemployment or lack
of decent work for the already employed, compounded by
labour markets that are generally less than efficient in job
search and matching. Unemployment in South Africa, by narrow
standards, is approximately 25 percent, an extraordinarily
high level, made even more worrying by its stagnancy or
growth at different times over the past decade. However,
although such levels of unemployment have detrimental
effects on all members of society, they do affect groups
differentially. Thus, unemployment rates are consistently,
significantly higher for women, Africans, people from rural
areas, and the less educated. Unemployment is highest, too,
amongst the youth in South Africa, and much higher than
international norms, despite rising unemployment amongst
youth globally in the past decade. In South Africa, youth is
officially defined as people aged between 14 and 35 years
old; however, this is not in line with international
definitions, which usually demarcate the 16 to 24 year old
group. The aim of this paper is therefore to shed some light
on the employment process of young South Africans and to
investigate firm level responses to the implementation of a
targeted hiring voucher for young job seekers aged 20-24.
The first section of the paper outlines the conceptual
framework used to investigate factors that determine
employment of young workers and the impact of a targeted
wage subsidy. The second section presents findings from a
firm survey illustrating the firm characteristics that are
associated with employing young workers and responses to a
hypothetical wage voucher. The third section discusses the
findings in the light of the theory while the fourth section concludes. |
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