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A Model of Comparative Advantage with Matching in the Urban Tanzanian Labour Market

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  • Andrew Kerr

Abstract

In this paper I build an equilibrium search model of the urban Tanzanian labour market that explains the choice between wage and self-employment and the variation in earnings across and within these sectors. Self-employment is very common in urban Tanzania and survey data show both that there are large overlaps in the distribution of earnings in private wage employment and self-employment and that there is little movement between wage and self-employment. This suggests that self-employment represents a worthwhile alternative to wage employment in small, low-productivity firms for the majority of urban Tanzanians, in contrast to the traditional view of African labour markets in which wage employment in small firms and self-employment are lumped together as the informal sector.

Suggested Citation

  • Andrew Kerr, 2012. "A Model of Comparative Advantage with Matching in the Urban Tanzanian Labour Market," CSAE Working Paper Series 2012-21, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    • Handle: RePEc:csa:wpaper:2012-21
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Stephanie de Mel, 2020. "A Job Worth Waiting for: Parental Wealth and Youth Unemployment in Ghana," IFS Working Papers W20/21, Institute for Fiscal Studies.
    2. Jonathan Lain, 2016. "Discrimination in a Search-Match Model with Self-Employment," CSAE Working Paper Series 2016-02, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    3. Girsberger, Esther Mirjam & Meango, Romuald, 2022. "The Puzzle of Educated Unemployment in West Africa," IZA Discussion Papers 15721, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    4. Jonathan Lain, 2019. "Discrimination in a search and matching model with self-employment," IZA Journal of Migration and Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 9(1), pages 1-35, December.

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