Poor, Informal, Global via CIPE Development Blog
A widely cited report from the International Labor Organization (2002) estimates that 70 percent of workers in developing economies operate in the informal sector. Throughout the 1990s the sector generated a majority of jobs across Latin America, a story with which CIPE is very familiar. A new story in Good Magazine renews the vivid, dynamic informal economy that emerged from the “shadows” thanks to Hernando de Soto and others. It’s a story set in Paraguay’s Ciudad del Este, but recurring around the world:
A fat Lebanese man emerges from a room behind the cash register holding an AK-47 as though it were a full cup of coffee.
“Four fifty,” he says, sucking on a toothpick. “American. And if you want help getting it across the border, that can be arranged.”...