ABSTRACT

Climate change has a major impact on productivity of different economic sectors as well as different labour groups. Here we study the crucial linkage between gradual climate change and availability of low-skilled labour in rural areas of South Africa. Using a nationally representative panel of micro-survey data, we derive marginal impacts of rising temperatures on labour availability. Our econometric findings suggest that optimal conditions maximizing weekly labour supply are heterogeneous across sectors. We develop an analytical model of overlapping generations to study the long-term impacts of future climate and socioeconomic changes on labour supply and welfare. Overall, high exposure of low-skilled labour to climate change and rising temperatures reduces the supply of low-skilled labour which in turn, reduces the wage gap between high-skilled and low-skilled labour. However, the overall impact of climate change on economy remains negative and the welfare in terms of output per adult drops by 20% compared to the baseline case with no climate change.

摘要

气候变化对不同经济部门和不同劳动群体的生产力产生重大影响。在这里，我们研究了渐进式气候变化与南非农村地区低技能劳动力的可用性之间的关键联系。使用具有全国代表性的微型调查数据小组，我们得出气温升高对劳动力可用性的边际影响。我们的计量经济学研究结果表明，最大化每周劳动力供应的最佳条件在各个部门之间是异质的。我们开发了一个重叠世代的分析模型，以研究未来气候和社会经济变化对劳动力供应和福利的长期影响。总体而言，低技能劳动力对气候变化和气温上升的高度暴露减少了低技能劳动力的供应，反过来，缩小高技能和低技能劳动力之间的工资差距。然而，气候变化对经济的总体影响仍然是负面的，与没有气候变化的基线情况相比，人均产出的福利下降了 20%。