IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/sbusec/v42y2014i1p153-164.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Benefits of a registration policy for microenterprise performance in India

Author

Listed:
  • Smriti Sharma

Abstract

This paper evaluates the effects of a voluntary registration policy with government authorities on financial performance of urban microenterprises in the Indian manufacturing sector. Using data from the 2006 World Bank survey of Indian microenterprises and applying the semi-parametric propensity score matching technique, we find that being registered leads to significant gains in sales per employee and value added per employee. Large gains are also noted for male-owned firms, those operating with or without paid labor and those operating outside of the owner’s home. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Smriti Sharma, 2014. "Benefits of a registration policy for microenterprise performance in India," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 42(1), pages 153-164, January.
  • Handle: RePEc:kap:sbusec:v:42:y:2014:i:1:p:153-164
    DOI: 10.1007/s11187-013-9475-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11187-013-9475-y
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11187-013-9475-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Simeon Djankov & Rafael La Porta & Florencio Lopez-de-Silanes & Andrei Shleifer, 2002. "The Regulation of Entry," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(1), pages 1-37.
    2. Aurora Ferrari & Inderbir Singh Dhingra, 2009. "India's Investment Climate : Voices of Indian Business," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 2579, December.
    3. Fajnzylber, Pablo & Maloney, William F. & Montes-Rojas, Gabriel V., 2011. "Does formality improve micro-firm performance? Evidence from the Brazilian SIMPLES program," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(2), pages 262-276, March.
    4. C. Praag & Peter Versloot, 2007. "What is the value of entrepreneurship? A review of recent research," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 29(4), pages 351-382, December.
    5. James J. Heckman & Hidehiko Ichimura & Petra E. Todd, 1997. "Matching As An Econometric Evaluation Estimator: Evidence from Evaluating a Job Training Programme," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 64(4), pages 605-654.
    6. Alex Coad & Jaganaddha Tamvada, 2012. "Firm growth and barriers to growth among small firms in India," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 39(2), pages 383-400, September.
    7. McKenzie, David & Seynabou Sakho, Yaye, 2010. "Does it pay firms to register for taxes? The impact of formality on firm profitability," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(1), pages 15-24, January.
    8. Alberto Abadie & David Drukker & Jane Leber Herr & Guido W. Imbens, 2004. "Implementing matching estimators for average treatment effects in Stata," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 4(3), pages 290-311, September.
    9. Grigor Sukiassyan & Jeffrey Nugent, 2008. "Associations versus registration as alternative strategies of small firms," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 31(2), pages 147-161, August.
    10. McPherson, Michael A. & Liedholm, Carl, 1996. "Determinants of small and micro enterprise registration: Results from surveys in Niger and Swaziland," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 24(3), pages 481-487, March.
    11. James Heckman & Hidehiko Ichimura & Jeffrey Smith & Petra Todd, 1998. "Characterizing Selection Bias Using Experimental Data," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 66(5), pages 1017-1098, September.
    12. Marco Caliendo & Sabine Kopeinig, 2008. "Some Practical Guidance For The Implementation Of Propensity Score Matching," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 22(1), pages 31-72, February.
    13. Rand, John & Torm, Nina, 2012. "The Benefits of Formalization: Evidence from Vietnamese Manufacturing SMEs," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 40(5), pages 983-998.
    14. Pablo Fajnzylber & William F. Maloney & Gabriel V. Montes-Rojas, 2009. "Releasing Constraints to Growth or Pushing on a String? Policies and Performance of Mexican Micro-Firms," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(7), pages 1027-1047, August.
    15. Monteiro, Joana C.M. & Assunção, Juliano J., 2012. "Coming out of the shadows? Estimating the impact of bureaucracy simplification and tax cut on formality in Brazilian microenterprises," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 99(1), pages 105-115.
    16. Mead, Donald C. & Liedholm, Carl, 1998. "The dynamics of micro and small enterprises in developing countries," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 61-74, January.
    17. Gaaitzen De Vries, 2010. "Small Retailers in Brazil: Are Formal Firms Really More Productive?," Journal of Development Studies, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 46(8), pages 1345-1366.
    18. Sascha O. Becker & Andrea Ichino, 2002. "Estimation of average treatment effects based on propensity scores," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 2(4), pages 358-377, November.
    19. Aurora Ferrari & Inderbir Singh Dhingra, 2009. "India's Investment Climate : Voices of Indian Business," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 6302, December.
    20. Alberto Abadie & Guido W. Imbens, 2002. "Simple and Bias-Corrected Matching Estimators for Average Treatment Effects," NBER Technical Working Papers 0283, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    21. Daniels, Lisa, 1999. "The role of small enterprises in the household and national economy in Kenya: A significant contribution or a last resort?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 55-65, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Amadou Boly, 2015. "On the Benefits of Formalization: Panel Evidence from Vietnam," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2015-038, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    2. Amadou Boly, 2015. "On the benefits of formalization: Panel evidence from Vietnam," WIDER Working Paper Series 038, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    3. Dettmann, E. & Becker, C. & Schmeißer, C., 2011. "Distance functions for matching in small samples," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 55(5), pages 1942-1960, May.
    4. Valentina A. Assenova & Olav Sorenson, 2017. "Legitimacy and the Benefits of Firm Formalization," Organization Science, INFORMS, vol. 28(5), pages 804-818, October.
    5. Thi Tran & Hai La, 2018. "Why do household businesses in Vietnam stay informal?," WIDER Working Paper Series 64, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    6. Grit Muehler & Michael Beckmann & Bernd Schauenberg, 2007. "The returns to continuous training in Germany: new evidence from propensity score matching estimators," Review of Managerial Science, Springer, vol. 1(3), pages 209-235, November.
    7. Roberto ESPOSTI, 2014. "To match, not to match, how to match: Estimating the farm-level impact of the CAP-first pillar reform (or: How to Apply Treatment-Effect Econometrics when the Real World is;a Mess)," Working Papers 403, Universita' Politecnica delle Marche (I), Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali.
    8. Martin Binder & Alex Coad, 2013. "Life satisfaction and self-employment: a matching approach," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 40(4), pages 1009-1033, May.
    9. Amadou Boly, 2015. "On the Effects of Formalization on Taxes and Wages: Panel Evidence from Vietnam," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2015-042, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    10. Amadou Boly, 2015. "On the effects of formalization on taxes and wages: Panel evidence from Vietnam," WIDER Working Paper Series 042, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    11. Palmer, Michael G., 2014. "Inequalities in Universal Health Coverage: Evidence from Vietnam," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 64(C), pages 384-394.
    12. Thi Bich Tran & Hai Anh La, 2018. "Why do household businesses in Vietnam stay informal?," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2018-64, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    13. Esposti, Roberto, 2015. "To match, not to matchm how to match: Estimating the farm-level impact of the 2005 CAP-first pillar reform," 2015 Conference, August 9-14, 2015, Milan, Italy 211625, International Association of Agricultural Economists.
    14. Amin, Mohammad & Islam, Asif, 2015. "Are Large Informal Firms More Productive than the Small Informal Firms? Evidence from Firm-Level Surveys in Africa," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 374-385.
    15. Andrea Floridi & Binyam Afewerk Demena & Natascha Wagner, 2022. "A Game Worth The Candle? Meta-Analysis Of The Effects Of Formalization On Firm Performance," Journal of Developmental Entrepreneurship (JDE), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 27(04), pages 1-27, December.
    16. Sascha O. Becker & Marco Caliendo, 2007. "Sensitivity analysis for average treatment effects," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 7(1), pages 71-83, February.
    17. Christian Volpe Martincus & Jerónimo Carballo, 2010. "Is Export Promotion Effective in Developing Countries? Firm-Level Evidence on the Intensive and Extensive Margins of Exports," IDB Publications (Working Papers) 36763, Inter-American Development Bank.
    18. Tommaso Nannicini, 2007. "Simulation-based sensitivity analysis for matching estimators," Stata Journal, StataCorp LP, vol. 7(3), pages 334-350, September.
    19. Suresh de Mel & David McKenzie & Christopher Woodruff, 2013. "The Demand for, and Consequences of, Formalization among Informal Firms in Sri Lanka," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, American Economic Association, vol. 5(2), pages 122-150, April.
    20. Candon, David, 2018. "The effect of cancer on the labor supply of employed men over the age of 65," Economics & Human Biology, Elsevier, vol. 31(C), pages 184-199.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Microenterprises; Registration; Firm performance; India; L25; L26; 017;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • L25 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Firm Performance
    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:sbusec:v:42:y:2014:i:1:p:153-164. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.