After another weak set of jobs figures this week showing formal- sector employment sliding in the third quarter, it may be worth looking at a little-noticed report that the World Bank released last month which dispels myths about immigrants and jobs. The title "Mixed Migration, Forced Displacement and Job Outcomes in SA" shows that far from stealing jobs from South Africans, each migrant in SA creates two jobs for locals. The study for the period 1996 to 2011 that "immigration has a positive impact on local employment, labour earnings and wages", with a 1% increase in the number of immigrants raising local employment by 0.2%. One reason for the positive impact, the report suggests, is that immigrants may be specialised in different tasks so they don't necessarily compete for similar jobs with locals, and adding them to the mix raises productivity overall, benefiting the whole economy. Another reason is that immigrants are nearly twice as likely to be employed as locals, possibly ref...
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