Social polarization in global cities: measuring changes in earnings and occupational inequality

Type Journal Article - Regional Studies
Title Social polarization in global cities: measuring changes in earnings and occupational inequality
Author(s)
Volume 51
Issue 11
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2017
Page numbers 1612-1621
URL http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/ref/10.1080/00343404.2016.1222072
Abstract
Social polarization in global cities: measuring changes in earnings and occupational inequality. Regional Studies. There is a paradox in the scholarly contributions to the social polarization debate. Studies that rely on occupational descriptions to measure employment change produce results that take the form of a professionalizing pattern of growth. By contrast, studies that rank occupations by income to measure employment change produce evidence in support of social polarization. This study applies both methods to measure employment change in greater Johannesburg (South Africa) from 1996 to 2012 in order to demonstrate why these different methods produce such different results. The results have important implications for how statistical evidence is used to test the social polarization hypothesis.

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