Teacher pay in South Africa: How attractive is the teaching profession?
Stellenbosch Working Paper Series No. WP04/2009Publication date: 2009
Author(s):
Educational quality is a challenged facing the South African schooling system. It is widely acknowledged that teachers play a central role in the quality of education received by students, and that the quality of teachers is largely dependent on the wage they are offered in the teaching profession. This paper investigates the state of teacher pay in the South African labour market by comparing the remuneration received by teachers with that received by their non-teaching counterparts. Remuneration is compared across educational attainment levels, years of experience and across age groups. A Lemieux Decomposition is used to determine what the distribution of teacher wages would look like if teachers were remunerated according to the same structure as non-teachers. It is found that the teaching profession is relatively unattractive to individuals at the top end of the skills distribution in the South African labour market.
JEL Classification:I2,J31
Keywords:Education, Wage differentials by occupations, Wage level and structure
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Upcoming Seminars
Monday 28 July 202512:00-13:00
Dr Neil Rankin: Ceo Of Predictive Insights & Stellenbosch University
Topic: "TBC"
12:00-13:00
Prof Willem Boshoff
Topic: "Two competing approaches in South African competition policy: merger control and anti-cartel enforcement over the past 30 years"
12:00-13:00
Prof Derek Yu: University Of The Western Cape
Topic: "Examining the teaching, assessment and research activities of the South African Economics Departments"
BER Weekly
13 Jun 2025 Another global flashpoint ignites as Israel attacks Iran’s nuclear facilitiesThe story for the week was initially relatively positive, with the overarching narrative being that the US and China agreed on a trade truce. However, overnight, Israel struck Iran’s nuclear facilities, military sites and killed senior commanders in dozens of strikes. While Israel has attacked Iran before, this is the first time nuclear facilities were...
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