Rather than portray formal and informal sector entrepreneurs as discrete groups, an emergent scholarship has conceptualized a continuum from wholly formal to wholly informal entrepreneurs. The aim of the article is to advance a degree of (in)formality approach by evaluating whether the institutional determinants found to explain whether an enterprise is formal or informal are also valid when explaining the level of (in)formality of enterprises. To do so, a 2017 survey of 500 retail microenterprises in the city of Lahore in Pakistan is reported. The finding is that higher levels of formality are more significantly associated with individual-level characteristics of the entrepreneur and enterprise, such as educational level and sales, than with formal and informal institutional conditions, as proposed by institutional theory. The article thus concludes by offering new theoretical implications and exploring some innovative policy measures to tackle informal entrepreneurship.

中文翻译：

---

超越正规/非正规企业二元论：解释企业家的（非）正规程度

新兴的学术界并没有将正式和非正式部门的企业家描绘成离散的群体，而是概念化了从完全正式到完全非正式的企业家的连续体。本文的目的是通过评估发现的用于解释企业是正规企业还是非正规企业的制度决定因素在解释企业的（非）正规程度时是否也有效，从而推进某种程度的（非）正规方法。为此，报告了 2017 年对巴基斯坦拉合尔市 500 家零售微型企业的调查。研究发现，与制度理论所提出的正式和非正式制度条件相比，更高程度的正式程度与企业家和企业的个人水平特征（例如教育水平和销售）的关联更显着。