Weekend Economists in the Market for a Change April 17-19, 2015 [View all]

[Demeter]

Well! What a week it was!

I'm talking about the weather, of course. The rest of the world went to hell in a handbasket, but Spring has returned to Michigan, at least the southern part. I saw the swans flying in; they nest on our ponds annually. The Daffodils are in bloom, and the birds are singing away. Ground crews are spiffing up the joint, and I've taken the plastic sheeting off the windows!

I even turned off the heat one night, but the next day was cloudy so there was no solar gain and I needed to turn it back on at night. It's off again, though!



Anyway, let's talk about the market--the Black Market. A Wikipedia definition would be in order:

A black market or underground economy is a market in which goods or services are traded illegally. The key distinction of a black market trade is that the transaction itself is illegal. The goods or services may or may not themselves be illegal to own, or to trade through other, legal channels. Because the transactions are illegal, the market itself is forced to operate outside the formal economy that is supported by the established state power. Common motives for operating in black markets are to trade contraband, avoid taxes, or skirt price controls. Typically the totality of such activity is referred to with the definite article as a complement to the official economies, by market for such goods and services, e.g. "the black market in bush meat".

The black market is distinct from the grey market, in which commodities are distributed through channels which, while legal, are unofficial, unauthorized, or unintended by the original manufacturer, and the white market.

The black market is considered a subset of the informal economy, of which 1.8 billion people worldwide are employed.

The literature on the black market has not established a common terminology and has instead offered many synonyms including: subterranean; hidden; grey; shadow; informal; clandestine; illegal; unobserved; unreported; unrecorded; second; parallel and black.

There is no single underground economy; there are many. These underground economies are omnipresent, existing in market oriented as well as in centrally planned nations, be they developed or developing. Those engaged in underground activities circumvent, escape or are excluded from the institutional system of rules, rights, regulations and enforcement penalties that govern formal agents engaged in production and exchange. Different types of underground activities are distinguished according to the particular institutional rules that they violate. Five specific underground economies can be identified:

1. criminal drugs
   
2. the illegal economy
   
3. the unreported economy
   
4. the unrecorded economy
   
5. the informal economy

The "illegal economy" consists of the income produced by those economic activities pursued in violation of legal statutes defining the scope of legitimate forms of commerce. Illegal economy participants engage in the production and distribution of prohibited goods and services, such as drug trafficking, arms trafficking, and prostitution.

The "unreported economy" consists of those economic activities that circumvent or evade the institutionally established fiscal rules as codified in the tax code. A summary measure of the unreported economy is the amount of income that should be reported to the tax authority but is not so reported. A complementary measure of the unreported economy is the "tax gap", namely the difference between the amount of tax revenues due the fiscal authority and the amount of tax revenue actually collected. In the U.S. unreported income is estimated to be $2 trillion resulting in a "tax gap" of $450–$500billion.

The "unrecorded economy" consists of those economic activities that circumvent the institutional rules that define the reporting requirements of government statistical agencies. A summary measure of the unrecorded economy is the amount of unrecorded income, namely the amount of income that should (under existing rules and conventions) be recorded in national accounting systems (e.g. National Income and Product Accounts) but is not. Unrecorded income is a particular problem in transition countries that switched from a socialist accounting system to UN standard national accounting. New methods have been proposed for estimating the size of the unrecorded (non-observed) economy. But there is still little consensus concerning the size of the unreported economies of transition countries.

The "informal economy" comprises those economic activities that circumvent the costs and are excluded from the benefits and rights incorporated in the laws and administrative rules covering property relationships, commercial licensing, labor contracts, torts, financial credit and social security systems. A summary measure of the informal economy is the income generated by economic agents that operate informally. The informal sector is defined as the part of an economy that is not taxed, monitored by any form of government, or included in any gross national product (GNP), unlike the formal economy. In developed countries the informal sector is characterized by unreported employment. This is hidden from the state for tax, social security or labour law purposes but is legal in all other aspects. On the other hand, the term black market can be used in reference to a specific part of the economy in which contraband is traded.

Well, that looks like 10 lbs. of **** in a 2 lb. bag, to me.

Let's see if we can tease out the "allegedly illegal" from the "absolutely immoral" and the "Darwinian stupid". Let's find the contracts, express or implied, that underlie "legality" and see if anything is permissible at all....