Perceptions of irregular immigrants’ participation in undeclared work in the United Kingdom from a social trust perspective

Post-Communist Economies

Horodnic

2017

To explain participation in the undeclared economy, the conventional supply-side approach evaluates the reasons people work in this sphere. This paper for the first time in Central and Eastern Europe explains the undeclared economy using a demand-side approach which evaluates citizens' motives for purchasing undeclared goods and services. Here, three potential explanations for purchasing undeclared goods and services, grounded in rational economic actor, social actor and institutional imperfections theoretical perspectives, are evaluated. Reporting data from 11,131 face-to-face interviews conducted in 11 Central and Eastern European countries in 2013, the finding is that all three explanations are used by consumers, displaying the need for a synthesis of these approaches, whilst a multinomial regression analysis identifies the specific groups variously using the undeclared economy to obtain a lower price, for social or redistributive rationales, or due to formal institutional imperfections. The implications for theorising and tackling the undeclared economy are then explored.

Section: Formal Sector Imperfections Explanationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Explaining participation in the undeclared economy in Central and Eastern Europe: a demand-side approach

Post-Communist Economies

Horodnic

2017

“…To control for other key explanatory variables that may also affect whether a formal enterprise witnesses informal sector competition, a series of mostly firm-level variables are used. These are derived from past studies of the WBES data (Hudson et al, 2012;Williams and Kedir, 2017b; and other studies of entrepreneurship and enterprise in the informal sector (Dau and Cuervo-Cazurra, 2014;Hodosi, 2015;Khan and Quaddus, 2015;Vu, 2014). These firm-level control variables are:…”

Section: Other Control Variablesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Explaining Variations in the Commonality of Informal Sector Competition Across Latin American and the Caribbean Countries

J. Dev. Entrepreneurship

Liu

2019

To advance understanding of the relationship between entrepreneurship and the informal sector, the aim of this paper is to evaluate and explain variations in the extent to which formal enterprises witness competition from unregistered or informal enterprises across Latin American and Caribbean countries. Reporting World Bank Enterprise Survey (WBES) data on 31 Latin American and Caribbean countries, this reveals that two-thirds (65.5 percent) of formal enterprises witness competition from informal sector enterprise. To explain the cross-country variations, four competing theories are evaluated, which variously view the prevalence of the informal sector to be determined by either: economic under-development (modernization theory); high taxes and state over-interference (neo-liberal theory); too little state intervention (political economy theory), or an asymmetry between the laws and regulations of formal institutions and the unwritten socially shared rules of informal institutions (institutional theory). A probit regression analysis confirms the modernization, political economy and institutional theories, but not the neo-liberal theory. Beyond economic under-development, therefore, it is too little state intervention and whether the laws and regulations developed by governments are in symmetry with the norms, values and beliefs of entrepreneurs. The paper concludes by discussing the theoretical and policy implications of these findings.

“…When undeclared work was conceptualised as exploitative low-paid employment, the overwhelming view was that it was necessity-driven endeavour conducted as a last resort due to the 'exclusion' of deprived populations from the formal labour market (Castells and Portes, 1989). However, with the recognition that a large proportion of all undeclared work is conducted by and for close social relations as paid favours for redistributive and communitybuilding purposes, a view has emerged that this is commonly undertaken as a voluntarily choice to help others out (Boels, 2014;Brill, 2010;Hodosi, 2015;Purdam and Tranmer, 2014;Ramas, 2016;Spandler et al, 2014;Williams, 2014a,b).…”

Section: Conceptualising Undeclared Work In Community Economiesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Reconceptualising undeclared work as paid favours: implications for community economic development

Community Development Journal

Horodnic

2017

The dominant depiction of undeclared work as exploitative low-paid employment has been contested by several locality studies which portray undeclared work to be mainly paid favours conducted voluntarily for close social relations to help them out. Reporting data from 28 European countries to evaluate its wider validity, the finding is that most undeclared work is composed of paid favours and conducted voluntarily, especially in Western Europe and Nordic nations. The outcome is a call to shift away from seeking its eradication and for recognition that such work is predominantly a form of active citizenship that needs to be fostered.