The literature has documented the negative impacts of economic uncertainty on output, investment and employment; however, no current study considers the influence of economic uncertainty on the informal sectors. This study investigates the effects of both the level and volatility of economic uncertainty on the shadow economy, through a global sample. Various econometrical techniques and estimation strategies are applied to panel data of 116 countries from 2002 to 2015, and show three interesting findings. First, increases in both the level and volatility of economic uncertainty are found to increase the size of the shadow economy. These effects are documented consistently over the long-term. Second, the impact of volatility is dominant over the impact of the level of economic uncertainty in increasing the size of the shadow economy. Third, the effects of economic uncertainty in increasing the size of the shadow economy are strong in low- and lower-middle-income economies, but less so in upper-middle-income economies, particularly in high-income economies.

中文翻译：

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当“不确定性”变成“未知”：经济不确定性对影子经济的影响

文献记录了经济不确定性对产出、投资和就业的负面影响；然而，目前没有研究考虑经济不确定性对非正规部门的影响。本研究通过全球样本调查了经济不确定性的水平和波动性对影子经济的影响。从 2002 年到 2015 年，对 116 个国家的面板数据应用了各种计量经济学技术和估计策略，并展示了三个有趣的发现。首先，发现经济不确定性水平和波动性的增加都会增加影子经济的规模。这些影响在长期内始终如一地记录在案。第二，在增加影子经济规模方面，波动性的影响要超过经济不确定性水平的影响。第三，经济不确定性对增加影子经济规模的影响在低收入和中低收入经济体中很强烈，但在中高收入经济体中影响较小，特别是在高收入经济体中。