This note examines how exogenous oil price shocks affect wage expectations and realised wage growth in South Africa.

_{by Chloë Allison and Phumlani Mavuma}

• This note examines how exogenous oil price shocks affect wage expectations and realised wage growth in South Africa.
• A 40% oil price shock leads to an immediate upward revision in wage expectations across firms, financial analysts and trade unions, while realised wage growth responds with a lag.
• Financial analysts display the strongest immediate response, whereas the response of trade unions’ one-year-ahead wage expectations exhibits stronger persistence.
• The delayed response of realised wages is consistent with South Africa’s collective bargaining structures and multi-year wage agreements, which may slow wage adjustment following shocks.
• The findings suggest that survey-based wage expectations may provide an early signal of emerging second-round wage and inflation pressures before they become visible in realised wage data.