ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)最新文献

{"title":"Informal Construction Employment, Earnings and Activities: A Boon or Bane for Tanzania?","authors":"B. Mkenda, Jehovaness Aikaeli","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2706036","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2706036","url":null,"abstract":"This paper assesses whether the growth of informal construction employment and activities in Tanzania are a boon or bane for informal workers. It examines the importance of employment and income provision, employment conditions, and linkages between formal and informal firms. It also examines the determinants of earnings of workers and the challenges faced by the informal construction sector. The study finds that informal construction activities are important in providing employment and income to people, although a significant number of employees work without contracts and pensions. The level of informal sector earnings is also lower than that of the formal sector. The statistically significant results from regression analysis of the determinants of earnings, which are positively related to earnings are: age, education level, and number of years of experience. The policy implications of this study include: the need for informal construction employees to be affiliated to pensions and health insurance benefits; requirement of a mechanism to enable them to formalize easily in order for them to access credit and to expand their operations; improvement in their skills to enhance their income levels so as to reduce poverty; and to empower them to share in the growth of construction activities.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"463 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2014-12-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"124361232","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Determinants of Transitions Across Formal/Informal Sectors in Egypt","authors":"A. Tansel, Zeynel Abidin Ozdemir","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2547146","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2547146","url":null,"abstract":"Informality is a salient feature of labor market in Egypt as it is the case with many developing countries. This is the first study of the determinants of worker transitions between various labor market states using panel data from Egypt. We first provide a diagnosis of dynamic worker flows across different labor market states. We develop transition probabilities by gender across different labor market states utilizing Markov transition processes. Next we identify the effects of individual, household, job characteristics and location on different mobility patterns by estimating a multinomial logit regression. The results point to the highly static nature of the Egyptian labor market. Government employment and the out of labor force are the most persistent labor market states. Further, only a few of the explanatory variables except high levels of education are found to have predictive power in explaining the transitions from formal wage, informal wage, self-employment, unemployment government employment and out of labor market states.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"13 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2014-11-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129715832","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Dirty Laundry: Are Chinese Legal Ivory Factories Using Poached Ivory as an Input?","authors":"B. Moyle, Kirsten Conrad","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2516504","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2516504","url":null,"abstract":"It has been alleged or suspected that the legal ivory factories in China launder poached ivory to make carvings. In this research the throughput of tusks across all 37 factories is analysed. The period covers the first allocation of tusks by the Chinese State Forest Administration in July 2009 up to January 2014. The number of factories is fixed, the number of carvers is stable and ivory carving is time-intensive. Diversion of carver-effort to use illegal ivory must come at the expense of legal output. If laundering is occurring it should have an appreciable effect on the rate at which legal tusks are consumed as carvings. The throughput of 1293 tusks is analysed with two modelling approaches. These were a Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) and a Seemingly Unrelated Regression (SUR) approach. Tusk throughput is affected by the size of the tusk and the experience of the carver. Factories also report tusks used up in production in batches. The models show that this reporting effect is partly explained by the Chinese retail spending cycle. No significant deviation in tusk throughput is detected. This implies that the legal factory system is largely clean of illegal ivory. The results also provide indirect evidence that the illegal ivory entering China is destined largely for a speculative market in raw ivory or for an autonomous illegal factory network.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"35 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2014-10-29","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116704447","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"An Exploratory Study of Guanxi Practice and Business Ethics in Mainland China: Foreign Firms","authors":"Hubert Shea","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2425152","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2425152","url":null,"abstract":"Guanxi has been viewed by the extant scholarly studies as the most widely adopted business practice for local and foreign firms to grow and sustain their businesses in mainland China. However, the practice of Guanxi has being criticized as the main cause of bribery and corrupt activities which are in contravention of business ethical standards adopted by foreign firms in their home countries. This exploratory research aims at shedding light on Guanxi practice of foreign firms and how it relates to their businesses and business ethics in mainland China. Based on in-depth interviews with 10 senior executives from foreign firms and qualitative data collected from different sources, the findings of this research demonstrate that the reliance on Guanxi practice is still salient to foreign firms due to the influence of numerous formal and informal constraints in mainland China. A majority of the researched foreign firms had a clear view that drawing on Guanxi with government officers and other business parties can possibly involve interpersonal exchange of favours that might lead to dubious business behaviours. In addition to the establishment of formal and informal forms of governance mechanism, a variety of Guanxi building and maintenance strategies were adopted by the researched foreign firms and due attention was paid not to run afoul of legal compliance issues in mainland China and their host countries as well as the local business convention. The findings of this research raises a number of theoretical and managerial issues pertinent to ethical practice of Guanxi and the institutional environment in which foreign firms operated. Findings of this research argue that foreign firms should commit themselves to business ethics in light of the new rules of globalisation but the influence of path dependence is still resilient in light of ambivalent socio-politico configurations in mainland China which can ingrain key challenges to their ethical business practice. Accordingly, a governance mechanism to maintain ethical Guanxi practice is recommended in this research. Furthermore, this research demonstrates that the Chinese government should strive to promote ethical business culture and enforce a range of administrative and legal reforms that can incrementally wipe out and disincentivise unethical Guanxi practice. This research offers essential insights for executives who intend to advance a better understanding of ethical business practice with different government officers and business parties in mainland China.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"38 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2014-04-15","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"116683212","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Tackling Europe's Informal Economy: A Critical Evaluation of the Neo-Liberal De-Regulatory Perspective","authors":"Colin Williams","doi":"10.30950/jcer.v9i2.496","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.30950/jcer.v9i2.496","url":null,"abstract":"Since the turn of the millennium, there has been widespread recognition that the informal economy is a sizeable and growing feature in the global economy. To explain this, neo-liberals have contended that the informal economy is a direct result of over-regulation, high taxes and state interference in the free market. Their remedy, therefore, is de-regulation, tax reductions and minimal state intervention. This article evaluates critically this neo-liberal perspective towards the informal economy. Reviewing cross-national comparative data from the 27 member states of the European Union, the finding is that few people explain their own and others’ participation in the informal economy using such rationales, that higher tax rates are not correlated with larger informal economies, and that lower levels of state intervention are correlated with larger (not smaller) informal economies. The article concludes by refuting the neo-liberal approach as a remedy and calling for more, rather than less, regulation of the economy.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"17 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2013-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132530056","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Post-Socialist Anomie Through the Lens of Economic Modernization and the Formalization of Social Control","authors":"Christopher S. Swader, L. Kosals","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2227312","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2227312","url":null,"abstract":"This paper inquires into how economic modernization impacts normative regulation by spurring, on the one hand (a) formal media of normative regulation (also known as formal social control) in the spheres of politics, economics and interpersonal relations and, on the other hand, (b) informality via the lower density of norms (also known as anomie). This work then asks how these two processes relate to one another. Evidence indicates that modernization is clearly linked to formal media of normative regulation in the spheres of politics (measured as greater government effectiveness), economics (i.e. lower proportion of shadow economy), and interpersonal relations (i.e. less reliance upon family and friendships). Moreso, our multi-level regression models, using World Values Survey data, report that political formality (government effectiveness) at the country level is linked to less anomie at the individual level. Overall, we suggest that economic growth initially brings normlessness through undermining informal social control. However, with greater economic stock, there is a tendency for greater political formalization, formal social control, which brings levels of anomie down. Furthermore, even after all controls, there is a strong anomie syndrome in post-communist societies","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"37 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2013-03-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"129931030","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"The Global Fight Against Child Trafficking: How Can It Be Won?","authors":"Sylvain Dessy, Caroline Orset, Legrand Yémélé Kana","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2026543","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2026543","url":null,"abstract":"We study how countries can coordinate their national action plans so as to fight global child trafficking. As both the demand and supply of trafficked children are transboundary in scope, international cooperation may be necessary to mitigate cross-country externalities. We show that specialization is the main feature of international cooperation. We also show that the pattern of specialization depends only on the level of economic development of state-parties. In particular, specialization leads to asymmetric national action plans when state-parties have different levels of economic development: the governments of poorer countries specialize on fighting the supply of trafficked children from their territories, while the governments of richer countries specialize on fighting the demand arising within their territories.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"70 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2012-03-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133808053","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Using Panel Data to Exactly Estimate Income Under-Reporting by the Self Employed","authors":"Bonggeun Kim, J. Gibson, Chul Chung","doi":"10.2139/ssrn.2955471","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.2955471","url":null,"abstract":"The income of the self-employed is often assumed to be understated in economic statistics. Controversy exists about the best method for estimating the extent of under-reporting and about the resulting measures of the size of the underground economy. This paper refines a method developed by Pissarides and Weber (1989) and uses discrepancies between food shares and reported incomes of the self-employed and other households to estimate under-reporting by the self-employed. In contrast to previous studies our panel data methodology distinguishes income under-reporting from transitory income fluctuations of the self employed, and provides an exact estimate of the degree of under reporting rather than just an interval estimate. Using panel data from Korea and Russia we estimate that 38 percent of the income of self employed households in Korea and 47 percent of the income of Russian self-employed households is not reported.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130683337","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Informal Employment in Indonesia","authors":"S. Cuevas, Aleli Rosario, Marissa L. Barcenas, Mina Christian","doi":"10.2139/SSRN.1611406","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.2139/SSRN.1611406","url":null,"abstract":"The paper attempted to use the February 2007 round of Indonesia’s National Labor Force Survey (Sakernas) for a comparative analysis of wages and benefits of formal and informal workers. While Sakernas was not designed for this purpose, the study explored questions in the existing survey that can be used to distinguish formal and informal workers. Because of data limitation, workers were classified as employed informally or “mixed”—a category composed of workers who cannot be identified, with precision, to be engaged in either formal or informal employment. Given this constraint, informal employment was estimated at the minimum to be at 29.1% of total employment in Indonesia. Informal employment is also highly concentrated in rural areas and is prevalent in agriculture and construction sectors. More women are likely to be informally employed than men, and women generally receive lower pay and are mostly unpaid family workers. To the extent possible the study was able to examine informal employment in Indonesia and to identify the gaps in the Sakernas questionnaire that can be addressed in future rounds of the survey for a successful comparative analysis between formal and informal workers.","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"105 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2009-04-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133700773","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}

{"title":"Defining and Estimating Underground and Informal Economies: The New Institional Economics Approach","authors":"E. Feige","doi":"10.1016/0305-750X(90)90081-8","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1016/0305-750X(90)90081-8","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":378044,"journal":{"name":"ERN: Informal Sectors & the Underground Economy in Transitional Economies (Topic)","volume":"9 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1990-07-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127505450","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}