This paper reports a negative relationship between the size of the shadow economy and generalized trust, in a sample of countries, both developed and developing. That relationship is robust to controlling for a large set of economic, policy, and institutional variables, to changing the estimate...

Social and economic changes that happened in Brazil in the 1990s have changed theorganization of female employment in the country. In this study, I examine the participation ofwomen in the informal sector in Brazil in 1996 and 2005. Using micro-level data from theBrazilian Monthly Employment...

Social and economic changes that happened in Brazil in the 1990s have changed the organization of female employment in the country. In this study, I examine the participation of women in the informal sector in Brazil in 1996 and 2005. Using micro-level data from the Brazilian Monthly Employment...

The history of alcohol in South Africa forms a fundamental part of the history of apartheid and isolation. Conflict has long surrounded the production, distribution and use of alcohol and this continues even today, although in traditional African society the use of alcoholic beverages was well...

We analyze whether the introduction or an increase of unemployment insurance (UI hereafter) benefits in developing countries reduces the e¤ort made by unemployed workers to secure a new job in the formal sector. We adopt a comparative static approach and we consider the consequences of an...

In a setting with a low level of anonymous trust and without an effective shadow of courts, the possibility to return a low quality good can work as a simple mechanism to overcome moral hazard in buyer seller transactions. Informal firms – in contrast to formal ones – operate in the hidden...

This paper clarifies the social and economic effects of employment in the informal sector on the poor in Russia in recent years. The article describes the extent to which the figures for informal sector at large and unofficial employment in particular vary in different estimates and the effect...

Unprecedented reduction of a number of working places in the social sector of agriculture, which took place due to reformation of the agrarian sector, resulted in a mass dismissal of agricultural employees and significant growth of unemployment in rural districts. This also resulted in...

This paper considers the idea of informality in market exchange, as introduced into the economic development literature by Keith Hart in the 1970s. In addition to Hart (1971, 1973) it will discuss three writers who may be considered his intellectual forerunners. Each, to a greater or less...

It is often argued that informal labour markets in developing countries are the engine of growth because their existence allows firms to operate in an environment where wage and regulatory costs are lower. On the other hand informality means that the amount of social protection offered to...