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　　If so,then depending on your local laws you may have been participating in whateconomists call the "informal" or "grey" economy. Inessence, the grey economy consists of legal activities whose participants failto pay tax or comply with regulations. The informal (or "underground"or "parallel" economy) is often taken to mean something broader,including illegal activities such as prostitution and drug dealing as well,although there is no agreed strict definition.

　　The greyeconomy is often thought of as something found at the margins of poorcountries, such as a hawker stand in Thailand or a roadside vendor in Ghana.But that is misleading. Although it represents a greater share of total outputin poor countries, it exists in rich and poor places alike. Recent researchsuggests that the grey economy is growing. Moreover, a new study suggests thatit may be slowing the overall economic growth of developing countries.

　　By itsvery nature, the informal economy's size in any country is hard to observe. Ina paper published a couple of years ago ("Size and Measurement of theInformal Economy in 110Countries Around the World," World Bank WorkingPaper, July 2002), Friedrich Schneider, of the Johannes Kepler University ofLinz, exhaustively examined the ways of estimating it. There are two basicapproaches. The first is direct: you could ask people whether they dodge taxes,or look at the results of spot tax-audits. However, people are unlikely toconfess to breaking the law, and tax inspectors do not usually check on arandom sample of the population. So the second method, indirect detective-work,is better. For example, you might compare data on cash transactions orelectricity consumption with official output figures. If the use of cash orelectricity is growing much faster than the measured economy, this mightindicate that the informal share of total activity is rising.

　　Using such techniques, Mr. Schneider estimated that the informal economy indeveloping countries in 2000 was equivalent to 41% of their official GDP. InZimbabwe, the figure was 60%. In Brazil and Turkey, around half of non-farmworkers are in the informal sector. In OECD countries the share of the informaleconomy was lower, but far from negligible, at 18%.

　　There is little mystery about why the informal economy exists. There are a lotof advantages to operating in the shadows. For a start, there are no incometaxes to pay. Avoiding social-security charges, which often drive a chunkywedge between take-home pay and employers' wage bills, can both cut labourcosts and thicken wage packets. People can also save a fair bit by ignoringsafety, environmental and health rules, not to mention intellectual propertyrights.

　　Indeed, in cross-country comparisons, the more expensive and more complicatedare taxes and regulations, the bigger is the informal economy as a share ofGDP. That explains why, among rich countries, Spain, Greece, Italy and Belgiumhave some of the largest grey economies and why America, Canada and Switzerlandhave much smaller ones. In recent years, the growth in the grey market in somepoor countries may owe a lot to the International Monetary Fund's austerityprograms, which increase taxes and thus encourage many entrepreneurs to optout.

　　A booming grey economy sounds like good news, if only because many of theofficially jobless are in fact earning a living. So if the poorest are winning,who loses? The entire economy does, according to a new study by Diana Farrellof the McKinsey Global Institute. The price for having a large grey economy canbe much lower productivity. Grey firms tend to be small and want to stay thatway lest they come to the attention of the authorities. However, their smallscale limits their ability to make the most of new technology and businesspractices.

　　以上就是关于灰色经济这篇GMAT阅读机经的全部内容，考生可以有选择的看看，机经虽好，但是也要适度哟。