|
on Informal and Underground Economics |
| By: | Peter Temin (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) |
| Abstract: | I describe the American economy in the twenty-first century as a dual economy in the spirit of W. Arthur Lewis. Similar to the subsistence and capitalist economies characterized by Lewis, I distinguish a low-wage sector and a FTE (Finance, Technology, and Electronics) sector. The transition from the low-wage to the FTE sector is through education, which is becoming increasingly difficult for members of the low-wage sector because the FTE sector has largely abandoned the American tradition of quality public schools and universities. Policy debates about public education and other policies that serve the low-wage sector often characterize members of the low-wage sector as black even though the low-wage sector is largely white. This model of a modern dual economy explains difficulties in many current policy debates, including education, healthcare, criminal justice, infrastructure and household debts. |
| Keywords: | inequality, dual economy, race, education, criminal justice, Nixon, Reagan, political economy |
| JEL: | H53 J68 N32 |
| Date: | 2015–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:thk:wpaper:26&r=iue |
| By: | Gustavo A. Del Angel |
| Abstract: | This essay analyzes the trends in payments in Mexico since 2002 and argues that there has been an important growth in the use of cashless digital payment instruments, namely the use of credit and debit cards, electronic funds transfers (EFTs) and mobile banking. However, the use of cash widely persists in the Mexican economy. The essay discusses the factors behind the persistence of the use of cash, and argues that low financial inclusion and informal economic activity are considered the main causes. Equally relevant is the fact that digital instruments are not a perfect substitute for cash as money yet, as it is the need to adequate payments services to the convenience and trust of segments of users, mainly population that still has little use or no access to financial services. |
| JEL: | E42 G20 G21 O32 E49 |
| Date: | 2016–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hoo:wpaper:16108&r=iue |
| By: | Laura Phillips; Deborah James |
| Abstract: | This historiographical overview examines the literature on women migrants in South Africa, arguing that it is important to consider domestic struggles and their impact on women’s urban experiences within and beyond the workplace in order to understand the unfolding of the migrant labour system in the 20th and 21st centuries. Looking at writing on pre-1994 migrancy, it highlights women’s experiences in the workplace, in the residential spaces they occupy, and in their associational life. We also draw out some of the major trends in the post-1994 period, focusing in particular on scholarship that considers HIV/AIDS. Migrant women, we argue, are neither simply home-based nor town-linked; rather their experiences and struggles provide the means to accommodate both while also transforming these polarities. |
| Keywords: | gender; historiography; migrancy; women; housing; apartheid; associational life; informal work; domestic work; factory work; HIV/AIDS |
| JEL: | R14 J01 |
| Date: | 2014–11–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:59443&r=iue |
| By: | Sokolovska, Olena |
| Abstract: | The present article considers theoretical analysis of VAT in international trade and examines current problems in the cross-border VAT fraud and main strategies to tackle them. The analysis of the theoretical background of VAT in cross-border trade in goods allowed us to determine both some main features related to the cross-border VAT fraud (organized crime, smuggling, money laundering and estimation problems) and measures to tackle them. We defined, based on the evaluation of current strategies aiming to reduce the possibilities of cross-border VAT fraud, the three main groups of such measures, notably, economic measures, institutional measures and procedural and technical measures. |
| Keywords: | VAT, fraud, international trade, cross-border transactions |
| JEL: | F1 F10 H26 H3 H30 |
| Date: | 2016–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:70504&r=iue |
| By: | Hector Noejovich (Departamento de Economía de la PUCP del Perú) |
| Abstract: | Este trabajo desarrolla la vida durante el siglo XVII de un comerciante de Potosí, cuya economía oficial estaba en decadencia de acuerdo con ideas usuales en la historiografía. El análisis se sustenta principalmente en series cronológicas e información institucional. En nuestra opinión, existía una estructura formal/informal de la economía colonial, cuyo polo de desarrollo estaba nucleado en Potosí; esa dualidad se sustentaba en conductas que utilizaban intersticios en las ordenanzas legales. JEL Classification-JEL: |
| Keywords: | Historia economica, herencia colonial, Peru, Potosi |
| Date: | 2016 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pcp:pucwps:wp00419&r=iue |