[go: up one dir, main page]

IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ulb/ulbeco/2013-103502.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Does taking the shadow economy into account matter when measuring aggregate efficiency?

Author

Listed:
  • Pierre-Guillaume Méon
  • Laurent Weill
  • Friedrich Schneider
Abstract
We analyze how adding the shadow economy to official output figures affects estimated technical efficiency at the country level. We find that this only slightly affects the ranking of efficiency scores, but increases average efficiency in a sample of 87 to 97 countries, both developed and developing. Our results are robust to the functional form of the production technology and the adjustment of labour to account for years of schooling.

Suggested Citation

  • Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Laurent Weill & Friedrich Schneider, 2011. "Does taking the shadow economy into account matter when measuring aggregate efficiency?," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/103502, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
  • Handle: RePEc:ulb:ulbeco:2013/103502
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    To our knowledge, this item is not available for download. To find whether it is available, there are three options:
    1. Check below whether another version of this item is available online.
    2. Check on the provider's web page whether it is in fact available.
    3. Perform a search for a similarly titled item that would be available.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Caselli, Francesco, 2005. "Accounting for Cross-Country Income Differences," Handbook of Economic Growth, in: Philippe Aghion & Steven Durlauf (ed.), Handbook of Economic Growth, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 9, pages 679-741, Elsevier.
    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. repec:bla:ecorec:v:73:y:1997:i:222:p:225-32 is not listed on IDEAS
    4. 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.
    5. Tanzi, Vito, 1999. "Uses and Abuses of Estimates of the Underground Economy," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 109(456), pages 338-347, June.
    6. Christopher Bajada & Friedrich Schneider, 2005. "The Shadow Economies Of The Asia‐Pacific," Pacific Economic Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 10(3), pages 379-401, October.
    7. Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Laurent Weill, 2004. "Does corruption hamper efficiency? A frontier analysis," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/8382, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    8. Caselli, Francesco, 2005. "Accounting for cross-country income differences," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 5266, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    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. 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.
    11. King, Robert G. & Levine, Ross, 1994. "Capital fundamentalism, economic development, and economic growth," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 259-292, June.
    12. Robert E. Hall & Charles I. Jones, 1999. "Why do Some Countries Produce So Much More Output Per Worker than Others?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 114(1), pages 83-116.
    13. Dominik H. Enste & Friedrich Schneider, 2000. "Shadow Economies: Size, Causes, and Consequences," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 38(1), pages 77-114, March.
    14. Friedman, Eric & Johnson, Simon & Kaufmann, Daniel & Zoido-Lobaton, Pablo, 2000. "Dodging the grabbing hand: the determinants of unofficial activity in 69 countries," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 76(3), pages 459-493, June.
    15. Zoido-Lobatón, Pablo & Johnson, Simon & Kaufmann, Daniel, 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).
    16. Prescott, Edward C, 1998. "Needed: A Theory of Total Factor Productivity," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 39(3), pages 525-551, August.
    17. 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.
    18. Friedrich Schneider & Kausik Chaudhuri & Sumana Chatterjee, 2003. "The Size and Development of the Indian Shadow Economy and a Comparison with other 18 Asian Countries: An Empirical Investigation," Economics working papers 2003-02, Department of Economics, Johannes Kepler University Linz, Austria.
    19. Kneller, Richard & Andrew Stevens, Philip, 2003. "The specification of the aggregate production function in the presence of inefficiency," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 81(2), pages 223-226, November.
    20. Caselli, Francesco, 2005. "Accounting for cross-country income differences," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 3567, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    21. Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Laurent Weill, 2004. "Does better governance foster efficiency? An aggregate frontier analysis," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 6(1), pages 75-90, January.
    22. Susan Pozo (ed.), 1996. "Exploring the Underground Economy," Books from Upjohn Press, W.E. Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, number eue.
    23. Peter J. Klenow & Andrés Rodríguez-Clare, 1997. "The Neoclassical Revival in Growth Economics: Has It Gone Too Far?," NBER Chapters, in: NBER Macroeconomics Annual 1997, Volume 12, pages 73-114, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    24. Lee C. Adkins & Ronald L. Moomaw & Andreas Savvides, 2002. "Institutions, Freedom, and Technical Efficiency," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 69(1), pages 92-108, July.
    25. Trevor Breusch, 2005. "Estimating the Underground Economy using MIMIC Models," Econometrics 0507003, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 15 Dec 2005.
    26. Susan M. Collins & Barry P. Bosworth, 1996. "Economic Growth in East Asia: Accumulation versus Assimilation," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 27(2), pages 135-204.
    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. Fan, Qingji & Kuper, Paul & Choi, Yun Hyeong & Choi, Seong-jin, 2021. "Does ICT development curb firms’ perceived corruption pressure? The contingent impact of institutional qualities and competitive conditions," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 135(C), pages 496-507.
    2. repec:bla:germec:v:11:y:2010:i::p:109-149 is not listed on IDEAS
    3. Sabrina Auci & Laura Castellucci & Manuela Coromaldi, 2021. "How does public spending affect technical efficiency? Some evidence from 15 European countries," Bulletin of Economic Research, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 73(1), pages 108-130, January.
    4. S. Auci, 2014. "The role of production chains in Italian industry: A steady connection between Italy's North-West and South," Rivista economica del Mezzogiorno, Società editrice il Mulino, issue 3, pages 617-658.
    5. Brock, Gregory & German-Soto, Vicente, 2017. "Regional industrial informality and efficiency in Mexico, 1990–2013," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 39(5), pages 928-941.
    6. Axel Dreher & Martin Gassebner, 2013. "Greasing the wheels? The impact of regulations and corruption on firm entry," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 155(3), pages 413-432, June.
    7. Rajeev K. Goel & Ummad Mazhar & Rati Ram, 2022. "Informal competition and firm performance: Impacts on input‐ versus output performance," Managerial and Decision Economics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 43(2), pages 418-430, March.
    8. Brock, Gregory, 2019. "A remote sensing look at the economy of a Russian region (Rostov) adjacent to the Ukrainian crisis," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 416-431.
    9. Brock, Gregory, 2015. "The informal economy of Rostov Oblast on the eve of the Ukrainian refugee crisis," Journal of Policy Modeling, Elsevier, vol. 37(5), pages 789-803.
    10. Gregory Brock & Constantin Ogloblin, 2014. "Another look at technical efficiency in American states, 1979–2000," The Annals of Regional Science, Springer;Western Regional Science Association, vol. 53(2), pages 577-590, September.

    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. Axel Dreher & Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Friedrich Schneider, 2014. "The devil is in the shadow: Do institutions affect income and productivity or only official income and official productivity?," Post-Print CEB, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles, vol. 158(1-2), pages 121-141, January.
    2. 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.
    3. 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.
    4. Bjørnskov, Christian & Méon, Pierre-Guillaume, 2015. "The Productivity of Trust," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 70(C), pages 317-331.
    5. 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.
    6. Pierre-Guillaume Méon & Friedrich Schneider & Laurent Weill, 2007. "Does taking the shadow economy into account matter to measure aggregate efficiency?," DULBEA Working Papers 07-18.RS, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    7. 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.
    8. Lars P. Feld & Friedrich Schneider, 2011. "Survey on the Shadow Economy and Undeclared Work in OECD Countries," Chapters, in: Friedrich Schneider (ed.), Handbook on the Shadow Economy, chapter 2, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    9. Schneider, Friedrich, 2014. "The Shadow Economy and Shadow Labor Force: A Survey of Recent Developments," IZA Discussion Papers 8278, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    10. Friedrich Schneider, 2014. "In the Shadow of the State – The Informal Economy and Informal Economy Labor Force," DANUBE: Law and Economics Review, European Association Comenius - EACO, issue 4, pages 227-248, December.
    11. 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.
    12. Colin C. Williams & Friedrich Schneider, 2016. "Measuring the Global Shadow Economy," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 16551.
    13. Schneider, Friedrich G. & Buehn, Andreas, 2009. "Shadow economies and corruption all over the world: revised estimates for 120 countries," Economics - The Open-Access, Open-Assessment E-Journal (2007-2020), Kiel Institute for the World Economy (IfW Kiel), vol. 1, pages 1-53.
    14. Méon, Pierre-Guillaume & Weill, Laurent, 2010. "Is Corruption an Efficient Grease?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 38(3), pages 244-259, March.
    15. Nikopour, Hesam & Shah Habibullah, Muzafar & Schneider, Friedrich & Law, Siong Hook, 2009. "Foreign Direct Investment and Shadow Economy: A Causality Analysis Using Panel Data," MPRA Paper 14485, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    16. 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).
    17. 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.
    18. Schneider, Friedrich, 2004. "The Size of the Shadow Economies of 145 Countries all over the World: First Results over the Period 1999 to 2003," IZA Discussion Papers 1431, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    19. Friedrich Schneider, 2007. "Size and Development of the Shadow Economy in Germany and Austria: Some preliminary findings," CREMA Working Paper Series 2007-15, Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA).
    20. 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).

    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:ulb:ulbeco:2013/103502. 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: Benoit Pauwels (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/ecsulbe.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.