IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/vic/vicewp/0003.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Modelling the Underground Economies in Canada and New Zealand: A Comparative Analysis

Author

Listed:
  • Lindsay M. Tedds
  • David E. A. Giles

    ()

Abstract

Recently there has been a resurgence of interest internationally in measuring the size of the underground economies. This has led to new approaches to this problem, and a more rigorous treatment of the associated time-series issues. In this paper we compare our recent underground economy results for Canada and New Zealand. These results provide time-series measures of the (legally-based plus illegally-based) underground economies in those countries, over similar historical periods, obtained via the same methodology. This methodology involves the estimation of structural MIMIC models, calibrated by estimating nonlinear currency-demand models. In addition to providing the underground economy measures themselves, we also compare the medium-term trends and cyclical characteristics of underground output in these two countries, and their responsiveness to changes in taxation policies. Special attention is paid to the effects on the New Zealand and Canadian underground economies of the Goods and Services Taxes in 1986 and 1991 respectively. These taxes are virtually identical in their design, but the context of their implementation led to quite different impacts on the associated underground economies.

Suggested Citation

  • Lindsay M. Tedds & David E. A. Giles, 2000. "Modelling the Underground Economies in Canada and New Zealand: A Comparative Analysis," Econometrics Working Papers 0003, Department of Economics, University of Victoria.
    • Handle: RePEc:vic:vicewp:0003
    Note: ISSN 1485-6441
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.uvic.ca/socialsciences/economics/assets/docs/econometrics/ewp0003.pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. David E. A. Giles, 1999. "Modelling the hidden economy and the tax-gap in New Zealand," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 24(4), pages 621-640.
    2. Zellner, Arnold, 1970. "Estimation of Regression Relationships Containing Unobservable Independent Variables," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 11(3), pages 441-454, October.
    3. David Giles & Lindsay Tedds & Gugsa Werkneh, 2002. "The Canadian underground and measured economies: Granger causality results," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 34(18), pages 2347-2352.
    4. David Giles, 1997. "Causality between the measured and underground economies in New Zealand," Applied Economics Letters, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 4(1), pages 63-67.
    5. Giles, David E A, 1997. "Testing for Asymmetry in the Measured and Underground Business Cycles in New Zealand," The Economic Record, The Economic Society of Australia, vol. 73(222), pages 225-232, September.
    6. Goldberger, Arthur S, 1972. "Structural Equation Methods in the Social Sciences," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 40(6), pages 979-1001, November.
    7. Allingham, Michael G. & Sandmo, Agnar, 1972. "Income tax evasion: a theoretical analysis," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 1(3-4), pages 323-338, November.
    8. David E. A. Giles & Betty J. Johnson, 1999. "Taxes, Risk-Aversion, and the Size of the Underground Economy: A Nonparametric Analysis With New Zealand Data," Econometrics Working Papers 9910, Department of Economics, University of Victoria.
    9. Giles, David E A, 1999. "Measuring the Hidden Economy: Implications for Econometric Modelling," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(456), pages 370-380, June.
    10. Kesselman, Jonathan R., 1989. "Income tax evasion : An intersectoral analysis," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 38(2), pages 137-182, March.
    11. David E. A. Giles, & Patrick J. Caragata, 1998. "The Learning Path of the Hidden Economy:Tax and Growth Effects in New Zealand," Econometrics Working Papers 9805, Department of Economics, University of Victoria.
    12. Jung, Young H. & Snow, Arthur & Trandel, Gregory A., 1994. "Tax evasion and the size of the underground economy," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 391-402, July.
    13. Watson, Harry, 1985. "Tax evasion and labor markets," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(2), pages 231-246, July.
    14. Rolf Mirus & Roger S. Smith & Vladimir Karoleff, 1994. "Canada's Underground Economy Revisited: Update and Critique," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 20(3), pages 235-252, September.
    15. Patrick J. Caragata, & David E. A. Giles, 1998. "Simulating the Relationship Between the Hidden Economy and the Tax Level and Tax Mix in New Zealand," Econometrics Working Papers 9804, Department of Economics, University of Victoria.
    16. Trandel, Greg & Snow, Arthur, 1999. "Progressive income taxation and the underground economy," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 62(2), pages 217-222, February.
    17. Frey, Bruno S. & Weck-Hanneman, Hannelore, 1984. "The hidden economy as an 'unobserved' variable," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 26(1-2), pages 33-53.
    18. Toda, Hiro Y. & Yamamoto, Taku, 1995. "Statistical inference in vector autoregressions with possibly integrated processes," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1-2), pages 225-250.
    19. Rolf Mirus & Roger S. Smith, 1981. "Canada's Irregular Economy," Canadian Public Policy, University of Toronto Press, vol. 7(3), pages 444-453, Summer.
    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. Loayza, Norman & Villa, Edgar & Misas, Martha, 2019. "Illicit activity and money laundering from an economic growth perspective: A model and an application to Colombia," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 159(C), pages 442-487.
    2. Davidescu, Adriana Anamaria & Schneider, Friedrich, 2017. "Nature of the Relationship between Minimum Wage and the Shadow Economy Size: An Empirical Analysis for the Case of Romania," IZA Discussion Papers 11247, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Unger Brigitte, 2009. "Money Laundering - A Newly Emerging Topic on the International Agenda," Review of Law & Economics, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2), pages 807-819, December.
    4. Nikopour, Hesam, 2003. "Measuring the size of underground economy in Iran with emphasis on the incentives for evasion of insurance premium payment (1961 – 2001)," MPRA Paper 13176, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 05 Feb 2009.
    5. Michael Pickhardt & Jordi Sarda Pons, 2006. "Size and scope of the underground economy in Germany," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 38(14), pages 1707-1713.
    6. Corina - Maria Ene & Andrei Ştefănescu, 2011. "Size And Implication Of Underground Economy In Romania - A Mimic Approach," Annales Universitatis Apulensis Series Oeconomica, Faculty of Sciences, "1 Decembrie 1918" University, Alba Iulia, vol. 1(13), pages 1-8.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    underground economy; tax evasion; MIMIC models; goods and services tax;

    JEL classification:

    • C5 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric Modeling
    • H1 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • H2 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue

    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:vic:vicewp:0003. 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: (Graham Voss). General contact details of provider: http://edirc.repec.org/data/devicca.html .

    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.