Authors: Paraskevi Koufopoulou, Athanassios Vozikis, Kyriakos Souliotis

Title: SHADOW ECONOMY IN GREECE: THEORETICAL CONSIDERATIONS IN CRISIS ERA

Abstract

Abstract

The last 40 years undeclared economic activities are studied thoroughly, adding new content to Economics. Occasionally, various definitions have been developed countless for the study of shadow economic activities and corresponding methods to estimate its size.

Our main purpose is to summarize depiction of the theoretical background of the informal economy, through numerous studies, reports of international organizations and reliable scientific texts in the world, in the light of specific conditions (nouns and adjectives). We applied a specific research protocol in two stages. Firstly we gathered data from international organizations reports, scientific and research articles in journals and reliable references. Secondly, we collect data from Google Scholar, EBSCO, IDEAS, NBER, IOS Press, SCOPUS and Elsevier data bases. We found 2,083 sources after entry application and exclusion criteria reached 62 scientific reports.

Since shadow economy reflects an undeclared economic activity (individuals, households, enterprises) study is difficult. Anyway, in countries dominated by the informal economy and corruption, such as Greece needed proper delineation and assessment of the phenomenon, as anyone who participates in such activity rarely admits, in carrying out surveys. We argue that in this way the right foundation will be to assess the phenomenon in order to formulate appropriate policy recommendations to prevent or combat (any illicit financial flows).

Key – words: shadow economy, informal economy, corruption.

JEL: O17, D73, E26.