Informal economy is highly developed in sub-Saharan African countries, particularly, in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU). In fact, the size of informal economy has been around 50% of GDP in recent years, despite the efforts made by international institutions (IMF and the African Union (AU)) to contain its development. It should be noted that informality increase has consequences on economy. On the one hand, a thriving informal economy can cause serious difficulties for policymakers because official indicators on unemployment, labor force, income, and consumption are unreliable. A policy based on wrong official indicators may be ineffective or even worse. On the other hand, a large amount of informality is found to be detrimental to economic growth. Notwithstanding these facts, this large size of informality is accompanied by a financial sector that is struggling to develop, despite the various efforts of the authorities in charge of this sector. Added to this is the low quality of public institutions in these countries. Based on these facts, the aims of this research is to analyze the effect of financial development on the development of informality, but also the non-linear relationship between informal economy, financial development and the quality of institutions, in of the West African Economic and Monetary Union countries (WAEMU), over period of 1991 to 2017. For this purpose, pooled mean group (PMG) model is used to analyze the effect of financial development on the informal economy. And for the non-linear analysis, threshold model specification (Panel Threshold Regression: PTR) is used. The results show that for financial development to contribute to reducing the size of the informal economy, the quality of institutions must reach a threshold of 0.575 on a scale of 0 to 1. It also shows that real GDP per capita and education attainment have a negative effect on informality. On the other hand, the unemployment rate, the rate of urbanization and the share of agriculture in GDP have a positive effect on informality.
| Published in | Journal of Business and Economic Development (Volume 5, Issue 3) |
| DOI | 10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19 |
| Page(s) | 187-198 |
| Creative Commons |
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, provided the original work is properly cited. |
| Copyright |
Copyright © The Author(s), 2020. Published by Science Publishing Group |
Informal Economy, Financial Development, Institutions, PMG Estimator, PTR Estimator
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APA Style
Aicha Tiendrebeogo. (2020). Informal Economy and Financial Development in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU): Role of Institutions. Journal of Business and Economic Development, 5(3), 187-198. https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19
ACS Style
Aicha Tiendrebeogo. Informal Economy and Financial Development in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU): Role of Institutions. J. Bus. Econ. Dev. 2020, 5(3), 187-198. doi: 10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19
AMA Style
Aicha Tiendrebeogo. Informal Economy and Financial Development in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU): Role of Institutions. J Bus Econ Dev. 2020;5(3):187-198. doi: 10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19
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Download@article{10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19,
author = {Aicha Tiendrebeogo},
title = {Informal Economy and Financial Development in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU): Role of Institutions},
journal = {Journal of Business and Economic Development},
volume = {5},
number = {3},
pages = {187-198},
doi = {10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19},
url = {https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19},
eprint = {https://article.sciencepublishinggroup.com/pdf/10.11648.j.jbed.20200503.19},
abstract = {Informal economy is highly developed in sub-Saharan African countries, particularly, in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU). In fact, the size of informal economy has been around 50% of GDP in recent years, despite the efforts made by international institutions (IMF and the African Union (AU)) to contain its development. It should be noted that informality increase has consequences on economy. On the one hand, a thriving informal economy can cause serious difficulties for policymakers because official indicators on unemployment, labor force, income, and consumption are unreliable. A policy based on wrong official indicators may be ineffective or even worse. On the other hand, a large amount of informality is found to be detrimental to economic growth. Notwithstanding these facts, this large size of informality is accompanied by a financial sector that is struggling to develop, despite the various efforts of the authorities in charge of this sector. Added to this is the low quality of public institutions in these countries. Based on these facts, the aims of this research is to analyze the effect of financial development on the development of informality, but also the non-linear relationship between informal economy, financial development and the quality of institutions, in of the West African Economic and Monetary Union countries (WAEMU), over period of 1991 to 2017. For this purpose, pooled mean group (PMG) model is used to analyze the effect of financial development on the informal economy. And for the non-linear analysis, threshold model specification (Panel Threshold Regression: PTR) is used. The results show that for financial development to contribute to reducing the size of the informal economy, the quality of institutions must reach a threshold of 0.575 on a scale of 0 to 1. It also shows that real GDP per capita and education attainment have a negative effect on informality. On the other hand, the unemployment rate, the rate of urbanization and the share of agriculture in GDP have a positive effect on informality.},
year = {2020}
}
TY - JOUR T1 - Informal Economy and Financial Development in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU): Role of Institutions AU - Aicha Tiendrebeogo Y1 - 2020/09/19 PY - 2020 N1 - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19 DO - 10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19 T2 - Journal of Business and Economic Development JF - Journal of Business and Economic Development JO - Journal of Business and Economic Development SP - 187 EP - 198 PB - Science Publishing Group SN - 2637-3874 UR - https://doi.org/10.11648/j.jbed.20200503.19 AB - Informal economy is highly developed in sub-Saharan African countries, particularly, in West African Economic and Monetary Union Countries (WAEMU). In fact, the size of informal economy has been around 50% of GDP in recent years, despite the efforts made by international institutions (IMF and the African Union (AU)) to contain its development. It should be noted that informality increase has consequences on economy. On the one hand, a thriving informal economy can cause serious difficulties for policymakers because official indicators on unemployment, labor force, income, and consumption are unreliable. A policy based on wrong official indicators may be ineffective or even worse. On the other hand, a large amount of informality is found to be detrimental to economic growth. Notwithstanding these facts, this large size of informality is accompanied by a financial sector that is struggling to develop, despite the various efforts of the authorities in charge of this sector. Added to this is the low quality of public institutions in these countries. Based on these facts, the aims of this research is to analyze the effect of financial development on the development of informality, but also the non-linear relationship between informal economy, financial development and the quality of institutions, in of the West African Economic and Monetary Union countries (WAEMU), over period of 1991 to 2017. For this purpose, pooled mean group (PMG) model is used to analyze the effect of financial development on the informal economy. And for the non-linear analysis, threshold model specification (Panel Threshold Regression: PTR) is used. The results show that for financial development to contribute to reducing the size of the informal economy, the quality of institutions must reach a threshold of 0.575 on a scale of 0 to 1. It also shows that real GDP per capita and education attainment have a negative effect on informality. On the other hand, the unemployment rate, the rate of urbanization and the share of agriculture in GDP have a positive effect on informality. VL - 5 IS - 3 ER -
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