The informal economy includes all those forms of economic and social relationships which escape state regulation. The book explores how people make choices and practice informality according to the available opportunities. Using empirical work, authors from across Europe look at different illegal or informal activities. They include legal and illegal markets, such as the selling of counterfeited goods and drugs, fruit picking, infrastructure construction, illegal wildlife and the illegal tropical timber trade, work in the hotel and catering sector, prostitution, stripping and street vending. The book aims to create a nuanced and empirically based approach in which the authors undertake critical analyses on the several ways informality operates within different societies and countries. It includes both economic analyses and detailed considerations of the social circumstances in different cities and countries. It shows how formal and informal work, legal and illegal trading (more often than not) overlap and are indistinguishable. The authors explore what the benefits (and disadvantages) are for workers in the informal economy - do they prosper, or is this survival work?
In rapidly changing economic times the emphasis on topical empirical foundations is important and poses new challenges to workers