The unobserved economy and the Dutch national accounts after the benchmark revision 2015

Brugt Kazemier; Michel van Veen; Sander IJmker

doi:10.2478/ceej-2019-0002

Figures & Tables

The value added of N2 illegal activities.For Croatia and Lithuania, only the average annual contributions in 2002–2012 and 2000–2010, respectively, are known. For Hungary, the value added of illicit drugs and prostitution were included at the implementation of ESA 95, base year 2002. Smuggling of tobacco was included at the implementation of ESA 2010. It is assumed that the relative contribution of illicit drugs and prostitution in 2010 is the same as in 2002.

Overview of estimates made for exhaustiveness, 2015

	Type	Production	Intermediate consumption	Value added
		Million euros
House renovations and maintenance	N1	1,485	743	742
Car repair and maintenance	N1	213	56	157
Food/beverage service activities	N1	280	49	231
Hairdressers and landscaping	N1	560	54	506
Cleaning homes and other buildings	N1	1,337	0	1,337
Babysitters and childcare	N1	316	0	316
Other	N1	373	11	362
Subtotal	N1	4,564	913	3,651
Cannabis	N2	4,053	1,137	2,916
Ecstasy, heroin, cocaine, etc.	N2	680	59	621
Smuggling cigarettes	N2	115	12	103
Fencing	N2	373	37	336
Temporary employment mediation	N2	316	16	300
Illegal copying and illegal gambling	N2	218	35	183
Prostitution	N2	607	214	393
Adjustment for double counting		–512	–421	–91
Subtotal	N2	5,850	1,089	4,761
Own account construction	N3	208	151	57
Tips	N3	567	0	567
Own account energy production	N3	176	0	176
Renting of dwellings	N3	164	50	114
Other	N3	12	7	5
Subtotal	N3	1,127	208	919
Cost fraud	N6	0	–763	763
Subtotal	N6	0	–763	763
Income in kind	N7a	158	–4,869	5,027
Functional approach of agriculture	N8	–1,839	–1,327	–512
VAT gap	N9	0	–970	970
Subtotal	N7a–N9	–1,681	–7,166	5,485
Total		9,860	–5,719	15,579

The contribution of illegal activities to GDP in Europe

		Value added of illegal activities as % of GDP	Sources
Austria	2011	0.15	Statistics Austria (2016), p. 307, p. 312^a
Belgium	2012	0.45	National Bank of Belgium (2017), p. 604^a
Bulgaria	2010	0.21	Reuters (2016); Presentation by M. Kolev, Sofia, 2016
Croatia	1995–2012^d	0.70	Croatian Bureau of Statistics (2014)^c
Cyprus	2010	0.80	Cystat (2014)^b
Czech Republic	2009–2010	0.40	Czech Statistical Office (2010)^b, (a), (b); Kahoun (2012)
Denmark	2012	0.15	Danmarks Statistik (2016), p. 209^a
Estonia	2010	0.52	Statistics Estonia (2017)^a
Finland	2012	0.08	Statistics Finland (2016), p. 359^a
France	2010	0.28	Insee (n.d.), p. 13, p. 277^a
Germany	2010	0.34	Destatis (2016), p. 359, p. 490, p. 501^a
Greece	2006	0.78	European Parliament (2016)
Hungary	2002–2010^e	0.97	Hungarian Central Statistical Office (2011^b, 2014)
Ireland	2010	0.73	Central Statistical Office (2014)^c
Italy	2011	0.87	ISTAT (2014, 2015)^c
Latvia	2010	1.30	Annex at Central Statistical Bureau Latvia (2014)^c
Lithuania	2000–2010^d	0.30	Markelevičius (2011)^c
Luxembourg	2012	0.23	Weber and Emprou (2014)
Malta	2010	0.33	National Statistics Office Malta (2015), pp. 467–470^a
Netherlands	2015	0.70
Poland	2010	0.65	Statistics Poland (2015)^c
Portugal	2011	0.36	Statistics Portugal (2017)
Romania	2010	0.47	National Institute of Statistics Romenia (n.d.)
Slovakia
Slovenia	2010	0.36	Statistični urad Republike Slovenije (2013)^c
Spain	2010	0.87	Instituto Nacional de Estadística (2014)^c
Sweden	2011	0.13	Statistics Sweden (2016), p. 392^a
United Kingdom	2010	0.56	Office for National Statistics (2014a, 2014b)
EU28^f	2010	0.51
Norway	2008	0.04	Gimming, Halvorsen, Skoglund, and Sørensen (2011), Evensen (2011)

Time series of the contribution of illegal activities (N2) to GDP

	Bulgaria	Cyprus	Czech Republic	Ireland	Latvia	Poland	Romania	United Kingdom
	% of GDP
1995	.	.	.	.	0.99	0.64	.	.
1996	.	.	.	.	1.11	.	.	.
1997	.	.	.	.	0.92	.	.	0.92
1998	.	.	.	.	1.59	.	.	0.87
1999	.	.	.	.	1.22	.	.	0.82
2000	.	.	.	.	0.93	.	.	0.77
2001	.	.	.	.	0.88	.	.	0.72
2002	.	.	.	.	0.89	.	.	0.68
2003	.	.	.	.	0.97	.	.	0.61
2004	.	.	.	.	0.91	.	.	0.63
2005	.	.	0.59	.	0.87	0.48	.	0.62
2006	.	.	0.49	.	0.78	.	.	0.71
2007	.	.	0.42	.	0.70	.	0.46	0.68
2008	0.28	.	0.37	.	0.73	.	0.38	0.62
2009	0.28	.	0.38	.	0.99	.	0.38	0.63
2010	0.21	0.8	.	0.73	1.30	0.65	0.47	0.56
2011	0.22	0.5	.	0.72	1.11	0.68	0.31	0.55
2012	0.23	0.4	.	0.70	1.00	0.78	0.30	0.50
2013	0.27	0.4	.	0.72	.	0.79	0.28	.
2014	0.25	.	.	.	.	.	.	.

A tentative estimate of the adjustment for tax evasion, 2015

	Type	Value added	Share tax evasion	Value added hidden because of tax evasion
		Million euros	%	Million euros
House renovations and maintenance	N1	742	100	742
Car repair and maintenance	N1	157	100	157
Food/beverage service activities	N1	231	100	231
Hairdressers and landscaping	N1	506	50	253
Cleaning homes and other buildings	N1	1,337	50	669
Babysitters and childcare	N1	316	50	158
Other	N1	362	50	181
Tips	N3	567	50	283
Renting of dwellings	N3	114	25	29
Cost fraud	N6	763	100	763
VAT gap (intra-community fraud)	N9	434	100	434
Total				3,900

The unobserved economy and the Dutch national accounts after the benchmark revision 2015

Figures & Tables

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Fig. 3

Overview of estimates made for exhaustiveness, 2015

The contribution of illegal activities to GDP in Europe

Time series of the contribution of illegal activities (N2) to GDP

A tentative estimate of the adjustment for tax evasion, 2015

Paradigm

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