Measuring the Participation of Irregular Migrants in the Informal Economy

The systematic study of irregular migrants' participation in the informal economy is beset by conceptual and methodological issues within the two research domains: economic informality and migrant irregularity. Both phenomena are characterized by competing definitions and statistical measurement challenges, making it even more difficult to accurately assess their intersection. This briefing summarises an approach that addresses the ambiguities and challenges in question. The approach relies on a conceptual framework that differentiates between the informal (formal) economy, unregistered (registered) firms, and irregular (regular) migration. The methodology uses nationally representative survey data to estimate size ranges of irregular migrant worker populations. The flexibility of the method is illustrated by applying it to Turkey and the United Kingdom, using the Turkish Household Labour Force Survey and the UK Labour Force Survey.