Black living standards in South Africa before democracy : new evidence from height
Date
2018
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Academy of Science of South Africa
Abstract
Very little income or wage data were systematically recorded about the living standards of South Africa’s black majority during much of the 20th century. We used four data sets to provide an alternative measure of living standards – namely stature – to document, for the first time, living standards of black South Africans over the course of the 20th century. We found evidence to suggest that living standards in the first three decades of the century were particularly poor, perhaps because of the increasingly repressive labour policies in urban areas and famine and land expropriation that weighed especially heavily on the Basotho. The decade following South Africa’s departure from the gold standard, a higher international gold price and the demand for manufactured goods from South Africa as a consequence of World War II seem to have benefitted both black and white South Africans. The data also allowed us to disaggregate by ethnicity within the black population group, revealing levels of inequality within race groups that have been neglected in the literature. Finally, we compared black and white living standards, and revealed the large and widening levels of inequality that characterised 20th-century South Africa.
Description
CITATION: Mpeta, B., Fourie, J. & Inwood, K. 2018. Black living standards in South Africa before democracy : new evidence from height. South African Journal of Science, 114(1/2), Art. #2017-0052, doi:10.17159/sajs.2018/20170052.
The original publication is available at http://sajs.co.za
The original publication is available at http://sajs.co.za
Keywords
Blacks -- Economic conditions -- South Africa -- 20th century, South Africa -- Politics and government -- 20th century, Blacks -- Anthropometry -- South Africa -- 20th century
Citation
Mpeta, B., Fourie, J. & Inwood, K. 2018. Black living standards in South Africa before democracy : new evidence from height. South African Journal of Science, 114(1/2), Art. #2017-0052, doi:10.17159/sajs.2018/20170052