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ILLEGAL WORK

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Synonymes ou variantes : ILLEGAL EMPLOYMENT
ILLEGAL EMPLOYMENT PRACTICE
ILLICIT EMPLOYMENT PRACTICE
ILLICIT WORK
Équivalents : TRABAJO ILEGAL
TRAVAIL ILLÉGAL
Domaine : Régulation du travail

Définition

Productive activities which are often illegal in nature and are not declared to public authorities.

Contexte

"In 2001 a pilot project was launched to estimate the extent of illegal work and its effects on the Dutch economy. Value added of organised crime is estimated to amount to 3.3 billion euro, less than 1 percent of the GDP.
In 2001 activities involving drugs accounted for nearly 60 percent of value added of the illegal economy. Prostitution and activities by illegal temp agencies accounted for 15 and 14 percent respectively."
(Statistics Netherlands, The Illegal Economy in the Netherlands, 2004, visited 2009-05-12)

Description

Illegal work concerns economic activities that are prohibited by law. As such, illegal workers do not declare these activities to the government, making all illegal work also undeclared work.

"For the OECD, illegal work is that which concerns persons who are not legally authorized to work (which should not be confused with illegal production). Specific examples are migrant workers without work permits or government employees who hold a second job incompatible with the duties of their first job. In many countries, labour by children below the prescribed minimum age is also considered illegal, as well as remunerated activities undertaken by unemployed workers while they are in receipt of unemployment benefits."
(Daza, J.L., Informal Economy, Undeclared Work and Labour Administration, ILO, Social Dialogue, Labour Law and Labour Administration Department, 2005, visited 2011-05-12)

Illegal Work and the Informal Economy

There are many criminal activities that can constitute illegal work, such as arms trafficking, drug dealing, etc. In some cases, the goods themselves will be illegal, such as the sale of illegal drugs; in other cases, the merchandise will consist of goods which are otherwise legal but which are sold illicitly to avoid tax payments or licensing requirements, such as unregistered firearms. These activities are the basis of the illegal economy.
(adapted from Informal Economy, On the Concept of Illegal Economy , 2006, visited 2011-05-12)

"The more a state represses freedom and free markets, whether this intervention is based on reasonable grounds or not, the bigger a parallel, irrepressible, underground or black or illegal economy grows. This brings governments to an issue of whether legalizing ‘some' of these businesses or improving the law in order to make it more effective in suppressing them. Therefore, the only economies in the world which are free in the absolute sense of the term are black economies, which, by nature and definition, are free of any sort of regulation whatsoever."
(Informal Economy, On the Concept of Illegal Economy , 2006, visited 2011-05-12)

On a Global Scale

Illegal work can range from one man selling drugs in his basement to groups of highly organized actors coordinating illegal global supply chains.

"Criminal organizations, increasingly involved in activities that tend to cross national borders, have evolved into transnational entities. With the globalization of trade and consumer demand, it was a natural progression for organized crime groups to move from national activity to transnational operations.
[…]
The tendency is for groups to have a home base in an area where the risks are low while allowing the international transfer of illicit goods and services to markets where the profits are high. Acting transnationally provides the groups with access to lucrative markets and points of vulnerability that they can infiltrate. These groups are bigger and much more profitable than traditional groups and it is common for criminal organizations to channel the profits that they make through the global financial system, using tax havens and relatively unregulated banking centers as a means to hide their illegal income.

Organized crime on a global basis takes the form of an unregulated enterprise that engages in many forms of illegal activity. Through transnational activities, organized crime groups have become major players in illicit industries, such as drug production and trafficking, that are global in scope and yield profits higher than the gross national products of some nations."
(Global organized crime, The Emergence of Global Organized Crime and its Transnational Influence, visited 2011-05-12)

Relations sémantiques

Hiérarchiques
Spécifique Drug dealing
Human trafficking
Money laundering
Générique Informal work
Quasi-synonyme UNDECLARED WORK
Associatives
Acteur/Action Cartel (En)
Illegal worker
Mafia (En)
Concept proche Labour exploitation
Lieu typique HIDDEN ECONOMY
Illegal economy
Propriété Illegality
Dictionnaire analytique de la mondialisation et du travail
© Jeanne Dancette