IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iza/izadps/dp3519.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Informality and Macroeconomic Fluctuations

Author

Listed:
  • Fiess, Norbert M.

    () (University of Glasgow)

  • Fugazza, Marco

    (UNCTAD)

  • Maloney, William F.

    () (World Bank)

Abstract

This paper examines the adjustment of developing country labor markets to macroeconomic shocks. It models as having two sectors: a formal salaried (tradable) sector that may or may not be affected by union or legislation induced wage rigidities, and an informal (nontradable) self-employment sector facing liquidity constraints to entry. This is embedded in a standard small economy macro model that permits the derivation of patterns of comovement among relative salaried/self-employed incomes, salaried/self-employed sector sizes and the real exchange rate with respect to different types of shocks in contexts with and without wage rigidities. The paper then explores time series data from Argentina, Brazil, Colombia and Mexico to test for cointegrating relationships corresponding to the patterns predicted by theory. We confirm episodes of expansion of informal self-employment consistent with the traditional segmentation views. However, we also identify episodes consistent with the sectoral expansion being driven by relative demand or productivity shocks to the nontradables sector that lead to “procyclical” behavior of the informal self-employed sector.

Suggested Citation

  • Fiess, Norbert M. & Fugazza, Marco & Maloney, William F., 2008. "Informality and Macroeconomic Fluctuations," IZA Discussion Papers 3519, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp3519
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://ftp.iza.org/dp3519.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Hakkio, Craig S. & Rush, Mark, 1991. "Cointegration: how short is the long run?," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 10(4), pages 571-581, December.
    2. Fugazza, Marco & Fiess, Norbert M. & Maloney, William, 2002. "Exchange rate appreciations, labor market rigidities, and informality," Policy Research Working Paper Series 2771, The World Bank.
    3. Maurice Obstfeld & Kenneth S. Rogoff, 1996. "Foundations of International Macroeconomics," MIT Press Books, The MIT Press, edition 1, volume 1, number 0262150476.
    4. Aureo de Paula & Jose A. Scheinkman, 2007. "The Informal Sector," PIER Working Paper Archive 07-033, Penn Institute for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania.
    5. William Maloney & Jairo Mendez, 2004. "Measuring the Impact of Minimum Wages. Evidence from Latin America," NBER Chapters, in: Law and Employment: Lessons from Latin America and the Caribbean, pages 109-130, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    6. Henrik Hansen & Søren Johansen, 1999. "Some tests for parameter constancy in cointegrated VAR-models," Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 2(2), pages 306-333.
    7. Pratap, Sangeeta & Quintin, Erwan, 2006. "Are labor markets segmented in developing countries? A semiparametric approach," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(7), pages 1817-1841, October.
    8. Rauch, James E., 1991. "Modelling the informal sector formally," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 33-47, January.
    9. Soren Johansen, 2002. "A Small Sample Correction for the Test of Cointegrating Rank in the Vector Autoregressive Model," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 70(5), pages 1929-1961, September.
    10. Jovanovic, Boyan, 1982. "Selection and the Evolution of Industry," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 50(3), pages 649-670, May.
    11. Fiess, Norbert & Shankar, Rashmi, 2009. "Determinants of exchange rate regime switching," Journal of International Money and Finance, Elsevier, vol. 28(1), pages 68-98, February.
    12. Loayza, Norman V. & Rigolini, Jamele, 2006. "Informality trends and cycles," Policy Research Working Paper Series 4078, The World Bank.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. A. Kerem Co?ar & Nezih Guner & James Tybout, 2016. "Firm Dynamics, Job Turnover, and Wage Distributions in an Open Economy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(3), pages 625-663, March.
    2. Kamila Fialová, 2010. "Labor Institutions and their Impact on Shadow Economies in Europe," Working Papers IES 2010/29, Charles University Prague, Faculty of Social Sciences, Institute of Economic Studies, revised Dec 2010.
    3. Carlos F. Prada, 2012. "Análisis de los flujos de trabajadores y la segmentación laboral en Colombia," Revista ESPE - Ensayos Sobre Política Económica, Banco de la República - ESPE, vol. 30(68), pages 74-113, June.
    4. repec:ilo:ilowps:482088 is not listed on IDEAS
    5. Norbert Fiess & Marco Fugazza, 2008. "Trade Liberalisation and Informality: New stylized facts," Working Papers 2008_34, Business School - Economics, University of Glasgow.
    6. Mauricio Santa María S. & Fabián García A. & Ana Virgina Mujica P., 2009. "Los costos no laborales y el mercado laboral: impacto de la reforma de salud en Colombia," Working Papers Series. Documentos de Trabajo 009186, Fedesarrollo.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    informality; labor market dynamics; self-employment; real exchange rates;

    JEL classification:

    • F41 - International Economics - - Macroeconomic Aspects of International Trade and Finance - - - Open Economy Macroeconomics
    • J21 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and Structure
    • J24 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - Human Capital; Skills; Occupational Choice; Labor Productivity
    • J31 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Wages, Compensation, and Labor Costs - - - Wage Level and Structure; Wage Differentials
    • O17 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Formal and Informal Sectors; Shadow Economy; Institutional Arrangements

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:iza:izadps:dp3519. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: (Holger Hinte). General contact details of provider: http://www.iza.org .

    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 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.

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

    IDEAS is a RePEc service hosted by the Research Division of the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis . RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.