As in the rest of Africa, there is a constant flow of people from poorer parts of South Africa
to wealthier, more urbanised provinces with stronger economies. For example, net
migration into Gauteng and the Western Cape has been and continues to be positive (Ziehl,
Econ3x3 2016). A pertinent question is how migrants from poor provinces fare in the labour
market in their newly-adopted area or province: do they find jobs or become unemployed?
This article compares the labour-market status of migrants to those of locally born residents
in the Western Cape, with a focus on migrants from the Eastern Cape where possible. As
used here, the term migrant refers to someone who was not born in the Western Cape or
Cape Town (depending on the case) and non-migrant to someone who was born in these
areas.