Dropping the books and working off the books

Rita Cappariello () and Roberta Zizza

No 702, Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) from Bank of Italy, Economic Research and International Relations Area

Abstract: The paper empirically tests the relationship between underground labour and schooling achievement for Italy; a country ranking badly in both respects when compared to other high-income economies, with a marked duality between North and South. In order to identify underground workers; we exploit the information on individuals social security positions available from the Bank of Italys Survey on Household Income and Wealth. After controlling for a wide range of socio-demographic and economic variables and addressing potential endogeneity and selection issues, we show that a low level of education sizeably and significantly increases the probability of working underground. Switching from completing compulsory school to graduating at college more than halves this probability for both men and women. The gain is slightly higher for individuals completing the compulsory track with respect to those having no formal education at all. The different probabilities found for self-employed and dependent workers support the view of a dual informal sector, in which necessity and desirability coexist.

Keywords: irregular employment; underground economy; dual informal sector; occupational choice; education; school drop-out; North and South divide (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I21 J24 O17 R23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2009-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-edu, nep-hrm and nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (11)

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Journal Article: Dropping the Books and Working Off the Books (2010)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_702_09

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