Title

How Petty is Petty Corruption? Evidence from Firm Surveys in Africa

Document Type

Article

Publication Title

World Development

Abstract

Evidence suggests that corruption is costly for African firms. This paper, however, shows that a minor difference in the way the question on bribe payments is asked has a large effect on estimates of the size of the burden. On average, firms report payments that are between 4 and 15 times higher when they report them as a percent of sales than when they report them in monetary terms. The paper discusses several possible reasons for this, but none explain the difference. One plausible remaining reason is that firm managers overestimate bribes when they report them in percentage terms. © 2010 Elsevier Ltd.

First Page

1122

Last Page

1132

DOI

10.1016/j.worlddev.2010.11.002

Publication Date

7-1-2011

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS