IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/pra/mprapa/2054.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Comparative Analysis of the Relationship Between Poverty and Underground economy in the Highly developed, Transition and Developing Countries

Author

Listed:
  • Elijah, Obayelu Abiodun
  • Uffort, Larry

Abstract

This study was undertaken with the goal of analyzing the relationship between poverty rates and size of underground economy in the developed and developing countries and exploring whether there is a link between them. There are technical problems in linking them in that getting information from those who have undertaken underground activities are difficult. Secondary data were used to established hypothetical relationship and primary data for the empirical analysis. The results of the descriptive analysis revealed that underground economy and poverty have no geographical boundary. Although the incidence, and the size differs from one country to another. The incidences of poverty and shadow economy are larger in the poor (developing and transition) countries when compared with the highly developed countries. There is also a causal link between poverty and underground economy especially in the developing and transition countries with common factors such as high unemployment and corruption rates affecting both poverty and underground economy. High social security system and tax burden were found to account for the high rates of underground economies in the highly developed countries even with people’s awareness of its implications when caught. In developing countries like Nigeria, most people embark on unlicensed (and hence illegal) micro-enterprises / activities like production and sale of pure water, yoghurts, cutting down of economic trees, illegal running of private schools, drug trafficking, prostitution, black-market currency exchange, fake disclosure of actual business profit, in order to increase their levels of income by tax evasion or avoidance in the name of surviving. Government can reduce this menace to certain extent by engaging itself in sustainable poverty reduction activities, tax policy changes, embarking anti-corruption campaign and increase in job opportunities within the formal economy. Key words: Poverty, underground economy, developed, transition and developing countries

Suggested Citation

  • Elijah, Obayelu Abiodun & Uffort, Larry, 2007. "Comparative Analysis of the Relationship Between Poverty and Underground economy in the Highly developed, Transition and Developing Countries," MPRA Paper 2054, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:2054
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://mpra.ub.uni-muenchen.de/2054/1/MPRA_paper_2054.pdf
    File Function: original version
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Foster, James & Greer, Joel & Thorbecke, Erik, 1984. "A Class of Decomposable Poverty Measures," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 52(3), pages 761-766, May.
    2. Phillip Cagan, 1958. "The Demand for Currency Relative to the Total Money Supply," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 66, pages 303-303.
    3. Tanzi, Vito, 1999. "Uses and Abuses of Estimates of the Underground Economy," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(456), pages 338-347, June.
    4. Bruno Frey & Friedrich Schneider, 2000. "Informal and underground economy," Economics working papers 2000-04, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    5. Bruno S. Frey & Werner W. Pommerehne, 1984. "The Hidden Economy: State And Prospects For Measurement1," Review of Income and Wealth, International Association for Research in Income and Wealth, vol. 30(1), pages 1-23, March.
    6. Dominik Enste & Friedrich Schneider, 2002. "Hiding in the Shadows; The Growth of the Underground Economy," IMF Economic Issues 30, International Monetary Fund.
    7. Thomas, Jim, 1999. "Quantifying the Black Economy: 'Measurement without Theory' Yet Again?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(456), pages 381-389, June.
    8. Kaufmann, Daniel & Kaliberda, Aleksander, 1996. "Integrating the unofficial economy into the dynamics of post-socialist economies : a framework of analysis and evidence," Policy Research Working Paper Series 1691, The World Bank.
    9. Sen, Amartya K, 1976. "Poverty: An Ordinal Approach to Measurement," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 44(2), pages 219-231, March.
    10. Mr. Friedrich Schneider & Dominik Enste, 2002. "Hiding in the Shadows: The Growth of the Underground Economy," IMF Economic Issues 2002/001, International Monetary Fund.
    11. Johnson, Simon & Kaufmann, Daniel & Zoido-Lobatón, Pablo, 1998. "Corruption, public finances and the unofficial economy," Sede de la CEPAL en Santiago (Estudios e Investigaciones) 34372, Naciones Unidas Comisión Económica para América Latina y el Caribe (CEPAL).
    12. Deepa Narayan & Patti Petesch, 2002. "Voices of the Poor : From Many Lands," World Bank Publications - Books, The World Bank Group, number 14053, December.
    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. Paraskevi Koufopoulou & Colin C. Williams & Athanassios Vozikis & Kyriakos Souliotis & Antonios Samprakos, 2021. "Estimating Shadow Economy Size in Greece 2000 - 2018: A Flexible MIMIC Approach," SPOUDAI Journal of Economics and Business, SPOUDAI Journal of Economics and Business, University of Piraeus, vol. 71(3-4), pages 23-47, July-Dece.
    2. Gustavo Adolfo Caballero Orozco, 2010. "Risk Preferences Under Extreme Poverty: A Field Experiment," Documentos CEDE 7717, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    3. Sefa Karagoz, 2020. "The Importance of the Informal Economy for Social Policy," Istanbul Journal of Economics-Istanbul Iktisat Dergisi, Istanbul University, Faculty of Economics, vol. 70(2), pages 479-505, December.

    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. Friedrich Schneider & Andreas Buehn & Claudio E. Montenegro, 2011. "Shadow Economies All Over the World: New Estimates for 162 Countries from 1999 to 2007," Chapters, in: Friedrich Schneider (ed.), Handbook on the Shadow Economy, chapter 1, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    2. Schneider, Friedrich, 2005. "Shadow economies around the world: what do we really know?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 21(3), pages 598-642, September.
    3. M. Kabir Hassan & Jung Suk-Yu, 2010. "A Re-examination of the U.S. Underground Economy: Size, Estimation, and Policy Implications," NFI Working Papers 2010-WP-04, Indiana State University, Scott College of Business, Networks Financial Institute.
    4. Friedrich Schneider & Robert Klinglmair, 2004. "Shadow economies around the world: what do we know?," Economics working papers 2004-03, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    5. Schneider Friedrich & Buehn Andreas, 2017. "Shadow Economy: Estimation Methods, Problems, Results and Open questions," Open Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 1(1), pages 1-29, March.
    6. Pasovic Edin & Efendic Adnan S., 2018. "Informal Economy in Bosnia and Herzegovina – An Empirical Investigation," South East European Journal of Economics and Business, Sciendo, vol. 13(2), pages 112-125, December.
    7. Friedrich Schneider, 2003. "The Size and Development of the Shadow Economy around the World and Relation to the Hard-to-Tax," International Center for Public Policy Working Paper Series, at AYSPS, GSU paper0324, International Center for Public Policy, Andrew Young School of Policy Studies, Georgia State University.
    8. Friedrich SCHNEIDER, 2016. "Estimating the Size of the Shadow Economy: Methods, Problems and Open Questions," Turkish Economic Review, KSP Journals, vol. 3(2), pages 256-280, June.
    9. Friedrich Schneider & Friedrich Schneider, 2008. "Shadow Economies and Corruption all over the World: What do we Really Know?," Chapters, in: Michael Pickhardt & Edward Shinnick (ed.), The Shadow Economy, Corruption and Governance, chapter 7, pages 122-187, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    10. repec:ces:ifodic:v:14:y:2017:i:4:p:19267788 is not listed on IDEAS
    11. Schneider, Friedrich, 2014. "The Shadow Economy and Shadow Labor Force: A Survey of Recent Developments," IZA Discussion Papers 8278, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Friedrich Schneider, 2017. "Estimating the Size of the Shadow Economies of Highly-developed Countries: Selected New Results," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(04), pages 44-53, February.
    13. Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "Shadow Economies of 145 Countries all over the World: What Do We Really Know?," CREMA Working Paper Series 2005-13, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    14. Friedrich Schneider, 2017. "Estimating the Size of the Shadow Economies of Highly-developed Countries: Selected New Results," ifo DICE Report, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(4), pages 44-53, 02.
    15. Colin C. Williams & Friedrich Schneider, 2016. "Measuring the Global Shadow Economy," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 16551.
    16. Nezhyvenko, O., 2019. "Indirect or Macroeconomic Methods in Measuring the Informal Economy," Journal of Applied Management and Investments, Department of Business Administration and Corporate Security, International Humanitarian University, vol. 8(4), pages 201-215, December.
    17. Feige, Edgar L., 2015. "Reflections on the meaning and measurement of Unobserved Economies: What do we really know about the “Shadow Economy”?," MPRA Paper 68466, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    18. Friedrich Schneider, 2000. "Illegal activities, but still values added ones (?): size, causes, and measurement of the shadow economies all over the world," Economics working papers 2000-10, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    19. Andreas Buhn & Alexander Karmann & Friedrich Schneider, 2007. "Size and Development of the Shadow Economy and of Do-it-Yourself Activities: The Case of Germany," CREMA Working Paper Series 2007-14, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    20. MAURIN Alain & SOOKRAM Sandra & WATSON Patrick Kent, 2010. "Measuring the Size of the Hidden Economy in Trinidad & Tobago," EcoMod2003 330700098, EcoMod.
    21. Suslov, N. & Mel'tenisova, E., 2015. "Analysis of Energy Price's Impact on Shadow Economies Around the World," Journal of the New Economic Association, New Economic Association, vol. 27(3), pages 12-43.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Poverty; underground economy; developed; transition and developing countries;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • P51 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Comparative Economic Systems - - - Comparative Analysis of Economic Systems
    • P52 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Comparative Economic Systems - - - Comparative Studies of Particular Economies

    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:pra:mprapa:2054. 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: Joachim Winter (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/vfmunde.html .

    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.