Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World

This paper studies the causes and consequences of informality and applies the analysis to Arab countries. It starts with a review of employment, labor informality and other labor market outcomes in the Arab world; and a discussion on the definition and measures of informality, as well as on the reas...

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Main Authors:	Elbadawi, Ibrahim, Loayza, Norman
Format:	Journal Article
Language:	EN
Published:	2012
Subjects:	Employment Unemployment Wages Intergenerational Income Distribution Aggregate Human Capital E240 Education and Research Institutions: General I200 Firm Performance: Size, Diversification, and Scope L250 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Other Economic Systems: Productive Enterprises Factor and Product Markets Prices Population P420 Other Economic Systems: National Income, Product, and Expenditure Money Inflation P440
Online Access:	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5686

id	okr-10986-5686
recordtype	oai_dc
spelling	okr-10986-56862021-04-23T14:02:23Z Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World Elbadawi, Ibrahim Loayza, Norman Employment Unemployment Wages Intergenerational Income Distribution Aggregate Human Capital E240 Education and Research Institutions: General I200 Firm Performance: Size, Diversification, and Scope L250 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Other Economic Systems: Productive Enterprises Factor and Product Markets Prices Population P420 Other Economic Systems: National Income, Product, and Expenditure Money Inflation P440 This paper studies the causes and consequences of informality and applies the analysis to Arab countries. It starts with a review of employment, labor informality and other labor market outcomes in the Arab world; and a discussion on the definition and measures of informality, as well as on the reasons why widespread informality should be of great concern. The paper also analyzes informality's main determinants, arguing that informality is not single-caused but results from the combination of poor public services, a burdensome regulatory regime, and weak monitoring and enforcement capacity by the state. This combination is especially explosive when the country suffers from low educational achievement and features demographic pressures and primary production structures. Finally, using cross-country regression analysis, the paper evaluates the empirical relevance of each determinant of informality. It then applies the estimated relationships to several Arab countries to assess the country-specific relevance of each proposed mechanism. Results suggest that informality has had negative marginal effects for Micro and Small Enterprises' (MSEs') performance in the Arab world. Moreover, informal establishments might have difficulty penetrating regional or international markets; instead, they are likely to specialize in producing for local markets. 2012-03-30T07:34:02Z 2012-03-30T07:34:02Z 2008 Journal Article Journal of Development and Economic Policies 15610411 http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5686 EN http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo World Bank Journal Article
repository_type	Digital Repository
institution_category	Foreign Institution
institution	Digital Repositories
building	World Bank Open Knowledge Repository
collection	World Bank
language	EN
topic	Employment Unemployment Wages Intergenerational Income Distribution Aggregate Human Capital E240 Education and Research Institutions: General I200 Firm Performance: Size, Diversification, and Scope L250 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Other Economic Systems: Productive Enterprises Factor and Product Markets Prices Population P420 Other Economic Systems: National Income, Product, and Expenditure Money Inflation P440
spellingShingle	Employment Unemployment Wages Intergenerational Income Distribution Aggregate Human Capital E240 Education and Research Institutions: General I200 Firm Performance: Size, Diversification, and Scope L250 Economic Development: Human Resources Human Development Income Distribution Migration O150 Other Economic Systems: Productive Enterprises Factor and Product Markets Prices Population P420 Other Economic Systems: National Income, Product, and Expenditure Money Inflation P440 Elbadawi, Ibrahim Loayza, Norman Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World
relation	http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/igo
description	This paper studies the causes and consequences of informality and applies the analysis to Arab countries. It starts with a review of employment, labor informality and other labor market outcomes in the Arab world; and a discussion on the definition and measures of informality, as well as on the reasons why widespread informality should be of great concern. The paper also analyzes informality's main determinants, arguing that informality is not single-caused but results from the combination of poor public services, a burdensome regulatory regime, and weak monitoring and enforcement capacity by the state. This combination is especially explosive when the country suffers from low educational achievement and features demographic pressures and primary production structures. Finally, using cross-country regression analysis, the paper evaluates the empirical relevance of each determinant of informality. It then applies the estimated relationships to several Arab countries to assess the country-specific relevance of each proposed mechanism. Results suggest that informality has had negative marginal effects for Micro and Small Enterprises' (MSEs') performance in the Arab world. Moreover, informal establishments might have difficulty penetrating regional or international markets; instead, they are likely to specialize in producing for local markets.
format	Journal Article
author	Elbadawi, Ibrahim Loayza, Norman
author_facet	Elbadawi, Ibrahim Loayza, Norman
author_sort	Elbadawi, Ibrahim
title	Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World
title_short	Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World
title_full	Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World
title_fullStr	Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World
title_full_unstemmed	Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World
title_sort	informality, employment and economic development in the arab world
publishDate	2012
url	http://hdl.handle.net/10986/5686
_version_	1764395957363933184

Informality, Employment and Economic Development in the Arab World

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