Level Of Informal Employment Research Articles

Неформальная занятость: оценка роли международного сотрудничества и факторов воздействия

Informal employment, which is labor activity without official registration and corresponding tax and social contributions, causes serious challenges to economic stability, social justice, and sustainable development, affecting social protection systems, budgetary resources, and equality in the labor market. The purpose of the study is to improve the understanding of aspects of countering informal employment and to investigate the factors affecting informal employment. Methods of the study are comparative analysis, multiple regression analysis, differentiated difference method, logical method, induction and deduction, systematization, and graphical method. The information base of the study consists of data from the World Bank and the International Labour Organization (ILO). It is established that international cooperation in countering informal employment, taking the example of EU countries, has not yielded significant results in achieving its goals. We have determined that the level of GDP per capita, as well as the indicator of the share of people employed in the service sector, are negatively correlated with the level of informal employment. In addition, we found that in countries with a more active community of online freelancers, the level of informal employment is generally lower. The results of the study contribute to the understanding of the mechanisms of combating informal employment and can also serve as a source of information for the development and implementation of policies aimed at countering this phenomenon. The work can also be the basis for further research on the relationship of informal employment with indicators such as unemployment, the proportion of people employed in online freelancing, and other indicators.

К ВОПРОСУ О МОБИЛЬНОСТИ И ИММОБИЛЬНОСТИ РАБОЧЕЙ СИЛЫ В РОССИИ И В МИРЕ

The subject of the study is the impact of the introduction of innovative technologies on changes in migration activity. The purpose of the study is to clarify the role of information infrastructure in the sedentarization of labor resources. The relevance of scientific research is due to the development of information and communication technologies, which are changing labor relations. The scientific novelty lies in the attempt to explain the influence of telecommunication technologies on resolving the issue of internal migration and shadow employment. The research methods are economic and comparative analysis. In the course of the study, the author obtained the following results: a high level of internal migration persists due to the underdeveloped telecommunications infrastructure and low data transmission speed. The author concludes that the creation of free high-speed Internet zones in regions with high unemployment and levels of informal employment can lead to a decrease in the shadow sector and an increase in the investment attractiveness of the region.

Consumption Nature of Indian Informal Workers: Engel’s Law Revisited

The level of informal employment in the Indian labor market shows the importance of investigating the nature of consumption among informal workers and determining the budget share among them. The Working-Leser model is used to identify the necessary and luxury goods among Indian informal workers. The budget share of food and non-food items among them will help us to validate Engel’s law. Informal workers are divided into three categories: self-employed workers, employees in the informal sector, and informal employees in the formal sector. Using the 68th round of the National Sample Survey data on Indian Employment and Unemployment for 2011–2012, we find food items, addictive items (e.g., alcohol and tobacco products), entertainment items, fuel, lights, and other non-food items are necessary, while health, education, jewellery and personal transport are luxury items for all types of informal workers in India. Engel’s law is therefore validated among the informal workers. The policy recommendation is that the government needs to spend more on health and education for informal workers. Spending more on these would not only improve the skills and efficiency of workers but also reduce their vulnerability.

The Random Forest Method in Research of Impact of Macroeconomic Indicators of Regional Development on Informal Employment Rate

The topic of quantitative research on informal employment has a consistently high relevance both in the Russian Federation and in other countries due to its high dependence on cyclicality and crisis stages in economic dynamics of countries with any level of economic development. Developing effective government policy measures to overcome the negative impact of informal employment requires special attention in theoretical and applied research to assessing the factors and conditions of informal employment in the Russian Federation including at the regional level. Such effects of informal employment as a shortfall in taxes, potential losses in production efficiency, and negative social consequences are a concern for the authorities of the federal and regional levels. Development of quantitative indicators to determine the level of informal employment in the regions, taking into account their specifics in the general spatial and economic system of Russia are necessary to overcome these negative effects. The article proposes and tests methods for solving the problem of assessing the impact of hierarchical relationships on macroeconomic factors at the regional level of informal employment in constituent entities of the Russian Federation. Majority of the works on the study of informal employment are based on basic statistical methods of spatial-dynamic analysis, as well as on the now «traditional» methods of cluster and correlation-regression analysis. Without diminishing the merits of these methods, it should be noted that they are somewhat limited in identifying hidden structural connections and interdependencies in such a complex multidimensional phenomenon as informal employment. In order to substantiate the possibility of overcoming these limitations, the article proposes indicators of regional statistics that directly and indirectly characterize informal employment and also presents the possibilities of using the «random forest» method to identify groups of constituent entities of the Russian Federation that have similar macroeconomic factors of informal employment. The novelty of this method in terms of research objectives is that it allows one to assess the impact of macroeconomic indicators of regional development on the level of informal employment, taking into account the implicit, not predetermined by the initial hypotheses, hierarchical relationships of factor indicators. Based on the generalization of the studies presented in the literature, as well as the authors’ statistical calculations using Rosstat data, the authors came to the conclusion about the high importance of macroeconomic parameters of regional development and systemic relationships of macroeconomic indicators in substantiating the differentiation of the informal level across the constituent entities of the Russian Federation.

Evolution and early government responses to COVID-19 in South America.

This article analyses the evolution of COVID-19 and early government responses to the pandemic in eight South American countries. To this aim, this study explores indicators which trace the progression of the pandemic and analyses factors related of state capacity which impacted on the early response of governments of implementing restrictive policies of social distancing associated with a suppression strategy. The pressure on the health systems is evaluated with early projections of the growth-phase of the epidemic, which is incorporated as an indicator in the analysis of early interventions based on Cox proportional hazards models. The results indicate that fiscal expenditure on health, regional and local government capacity, and pressure on the health system accelerate government response with stringent interventions. A counter-intuitive finding is that the economic strength of a country delays these types of reactions. The effect of these interventions is something that should be studied in greater depth, considering, for example, sociocultural factors. Lastly, only cases such as Uruguay and Paraguay show some signs of having the pandemic relatively under control by mid-May, while Brazil and Peru face very adverse scenarios. In this context, considering the characteristics of the states in the region and the level of informal employment, it will be a public policy challenge to keep the equilibrium between restrictive measures and the economic and social problems which these responses imply in the medium term.

Structural-dynamic features of population employment in Ukraine service industry sphere

The structural-dynamic peculiarities of employment in the service industry are investigated. The facts that the service industry plays an increasing role in the economic growth of the countries and that the share of employed in the service industry in the countries with the developed market economy is 75–80% are emphasized. Therefore, Ukrainian economy has significant capacity for the employment increase in this industry. It is determined that the high share of employed in industries requiring highly skilled personnel indicates the development of innovative-technological economy sectors. It will promote the country’s GDP growth in future. The share of employment in such industries is defined to remain insignificant in Ukraine, as typical for to the countries with transition economies. The structure of employment in the service industry sectors in Ukraine and developed countries is determined to be distinctly different, although it provides Ukraine with additional opportunities to develop competitive sectors of service industry. It is revealed that the average weighted rate of employment growth has declined in 2018 in comparison with 2013 (81.59%), which is peculiar to the Ukrainian economy in general, where the 80.18 employment growth for the same period was caused by decline of economic activity in the country and was related to the unstable political situation and military actions, substantial inflation, declining foreign direct investment, etc. The formation of employment structure in service industry is influenced by transformation processes characteristic for the countries with transition economies. The evidence of effective development of service indusrtry is the growth of labor productivity. The significant share of employment in the region's service industry, along with low labour productivity, indicates the substantial shadowing of employment. In Ukraine, the level of informal employment is the highest in trade, transport and temporary accommodation sectors. At the same time, the growing share of employed in the industries with high added value like ICT, finances, healthcare, administrative and support services, scientific and professional activity, etc. indicates the efficient structural transformation of Ukrainian economy.

Влияние экономических факторов на уровень занятости в неформальном секторе: региональный аспект

The article attempts to estimate the impact of economic factors on the employment rate in the informal sector among Russian federal subjects based on the dynamic model. To make calculations the authors used panel data on federal subjects. All subjects were divided into 3 groups based on the rate of employment in the informal sector in 2015: first group (19 subjects) – regions with minimal employment rate, second (39) – average employment rate, third (19) – maximal employment rate. The authors used the following factors for assessment: demand factors – income level in the region, vacancies; supply factors – unemployment or characteristic of employment; institutional factor – level of taxation. Based on the calculations the authors make following conclusions. The most impactful factors are demand-based. The negative connection between GRP per capita and the informal sector is statistically confirmed. The increase in supply of work positions in the formal sector decreases the rate of employment in the informal sector, which is especially important for the third group of regions with the maximal level of informal employment that have ‘compelled entrepreneurship’. The article also statistically confirms the high inertia of rate of the employed in the informal sector

Tackling informal employment in developing and transition economies: a critical evaluation of the neo-liberal approach

This paper evaluates critically the argument of neo-liberals that informal employment is a result of high taxes, public sector corruption and too much state interference in the free market and that the consequent solution is to reduce taxes, public sector corruption and the regulatory burden via minimal state intervention. Comparing International Labour Organization data on the cross-national variations in the prevalence of informal employment with the variables levels of tax rates, corruption and state intervention across 41 developing and transition economies, little support is found for the neo-liberal approach. Instead, lower (not higher) levels of informal employment are found to be associated with higher levels of regulation and state intervention, resulting in a call for more, rather than less, regulation and state intervention to protect workers in developing and transition economies. The theoretical and policy implications are discussed.

Combating Informal Employment in Latin America: A Critical Evaluation of the Neo-Liberal Policy Approach

This paper evaluates critically the neo-liberal perspective which contends that informal employment results from high taxes, public sector corruption and too much state interference in the free market and that the consequent remedy is to reduce taxes, public sector corruption and the regulatory burden via minimal state intervention. Reporting International Labor Organization data on the cross-national variations in the level of informal employment across 16 Latin American economies, and analyzing the economic and social conditions across these countries, no support is found for the neo-liberal tenets that higher tax rates, greater levels of corruption and state interference are correlated with higher levels of informal employment. Instead, higher levels of regulation and state intervention are associated with lower (not higher) levels of informal employment resulting in a tentative call for more, rather than less, regulation of the economy and state intervention to protect workers. The theoretical and policy implications are discussed.

Earnings inequality and the informal economy

We analyse the extent and evolution of informality and inequality in the Serbian labour market between 2002 and 2007, using data from the Living Standard Measurement Surveys. Two surprising results emerge. First, the level of informal employment has risen significantly over the period, despite strong economic growth and the introduction of a range of market-oriented reforms. Secondly, the level of inequality in earnings seems to have remained more or less constant over the period, in contrast to the experience of other countries at a similar stage of transition. We show that informal employees earn significantly less than those in the formal sector, controlling for a range of other variables, and informality plays an increasingly important role in explaining earnings inequality.