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Shadow Activity and Unemployment in a Depressed Labour Market

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Author Info
Boeri, Tito
Garibaldi, Pietro

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Abstract

This Paper studies the border between shadow employment and unemployment. It argues that the two macroeconomic phenomena are two faces of the same coin: any policy aimed at reducing the former will increase the latter. Theoretically, it proposes and solves a matching model of the labour market, where shadow employment emerges in equilibrium as the endogenous response of firms and workers who felt overburdened by taxes and regulations. While the model we propose neatly rationalizes the labour market trade-off implied by ‘shadow reducing policies’, it suggests that economies with low unemployment turnover should be characterized also by low turnover along the shadow margins. Since existing estimates of shadow employment are silent on labour market flows and on the relation between shadow activity and the main labour market aggregates, we perform original empirical work on the border between employment, unemployment and inactivity, and we find that Italian shadow employment has longer duration in regions with lower unemployment turnover. We also find support to the substantive assumptions of the model.

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Paper provided by C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers in its series CEPR Discussion Papers with number 3433.

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Date of creation: Jun 2002
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Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:3433

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Related research
Keywords: matching; shadow activity; unemployment;

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
J30 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - General

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References listed on IDEAS
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  1. Dixon, Huw, 1999. "Controversy: On the Use of the 'Hidden Economy' Estimates," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(456), pages F335-37, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  2. Friedrich Schneider & Dominik H. Enste, 2000. "Shadow Economies: Size, Causes, and Consequences," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(1), pages 77-114, March. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  3. Kolm, Ann-Sofie & Larsen, Birthe, 2001. "Wages, Unemployment, and the Underground Economy," Working Paper Series 2001:8, Uppsala University, Department of Economics. [Downloadable!]
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  4. Garibaldi, Pietro, 1999. "Search Unemployment with Advance Notice," CEPR Discussion Papers 2164, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  5. Saint-Paul, Gilles, 1995. "The High Unemployment Trap," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 110(2), pages 527-50, May. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Edgar L. Feige, 2005. "The Underground Economy And The Currency Enigma," Macroeconomics 0502004, EconWPA. [Downloadable!]
  7. Tito Boeri & Axel Börsch-Supan & Guido Tabellini, 2001. "Would you like to shrink the welfare state? A survey of European citizens," Economic Policy, CEPR, CES, MSH, vol. 16(32), pages 7-50, 04. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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