Household Social Mobility for Paid Domestic Workers and Other Low-Skilled Women Employed in South Africa

Abstract

This paper explores the theme of patronage by examining how the social mobility prospects of paid domestic workers differ from other vulnerable low-skilled black and colored women in post-apartheid South Africa. The literature provides contradictory predictions about the effects of a relationship with an affluent employer on a vulnerable employed woman and her household. Using data from the 2002–8 General Household Survey, this study uses propensity score matching (PSM) to compare paid domestic workers versus employed women with similar labor market characteristics. It finds that the household members of paid domestic workers tend to have a lower likelihood of unemployment, lower unemployment duration, higher likelihood of owning assets, and lower prevalence of hunger. It is, however, important to see evidence of such benefits in the context of a complicated employment relationship and to highlight that such benefits can reflect both altruistic and self-serving employer motivations.

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