This paper documents the link between finance and informal competition. Using longitudinal firm-level data, we show that formal firms that are more exposed to the competition of informal firms are less likely to apply for a bank loan. This result is not due to sample selection, omitted variable...

Effective domestic revenue mobilization has gained renewed urgency, especially in the light of the need to recover from the COVID-19 pandemic. In taxation debates, the 'informal sectors' have hitherto been assumed to be a part of the problem and implicitly mistaken for lucrative tax bases....

Vast literature is available covering main Informal Economy (IE) causes and consequences for Latin America and Caribbean (LAC), but its size estimation has been mainly limited to worldwide models applied to the region. This paper proposes a MIMIC Base Model using a data set composed by 41...

This study examines the effects of mining productivity shocks on the formal-informal duality in manufacturing and services. Using firm census data from 2014 for Ghana, we measure the rates of informality along extensive (unregistered firms) and intensive (registered firms hiring labourers 'off...

We argue that societies sometimes choose not to enforce the law to gain 'flexibility'. Especially developing countries face a dilemma between discretion and commitment to only partially-contingent rules. Rules are good for incentives, but discretion may be more 'flexible'. We embed this dilemma...

This paper studies the impact of product and labor market regulations on informality andunemployment in a general framework where formal and informal firms are subject to thesame externalities, differing only with respect to some parameter values. Both formal andinformal firms have monopoly...

This article sheds light on the dynamics of the Argentine labor market, using quarterly data from the Argentine Labor Force Survey for the period 2003Q3 to 2020Q1. We examine quarterly transition rates in a four-state model with formal employment, informal employment, unemployment, and...

This chapter analyzes the incidence on income distribution by a comprehensive array of direct and indirect taxes in ten Latin American countries circa 2018. The study finds that although there is a significant heterogeneity, the redistributive impact is equalizing for direct taxes and...

This paper examines a much overlooked link between credit markets and formalization: since access to bank credit typically requires compliance with tax and employment legislation, firms are more likely to incur such formalization costs once bank credit is more widely available at lower cost; if...

This paper studies the interactions between the structure of product demand, relative wages, and the allocation of economic activity across two sectors. The agrarian sector produces a homogeneous good and consists of informal firms employing adults and children. The modern sector produces a...