Misplaced Pages

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79-522: The Collection procures and preserves diverse manuscripts, from all over the world, irrespective of the geography, culture, linguistic, race and religious background. It declares that its interest is in "advancing the study of human culture and civilization" over many millennia. Some of its recent acquisitions have been obtained from the civil war-affected regions of the Middle East and Afghanistan, where warlords and smugglers have destroyed ancient sites to find

158-455: A front business that is not illegal. Good (economics) In economics , goods are items that satisfy human wants and provide utility , for example, to a consumer making a purchase of a satisfying product . A common distinction is made between goods which are transferable, and services , which are not transferable. A good is an "economic good" if it is useful to people but scarce in relation to its demand so that human effort

237-431: A "tax gap" of $ 450–600 billion. The "unrecorded economy" circumvents the institutional rules that define the reporting requirements of government statistical agencies. A summary measure of the unrecorded economy is the amount of unrecorded income, namely the amount of income that should (under existing rules and conventions) be recorded in national accounting systems (e.g., National Income and Product Accounts ) but

316-446: A black market exists to supply them. Despite law enforcement efforts to intercept them, demand remains high, providing a large profit motive for organized criminal groups to keep drugs supplied. The United Nations has reported that the retail market value of illegal drugs is $ 502 billion. Although law enforcement agencies intercept a fraction of drug traffickers and incarcerate thousands of wholesale and retail sellers and users,

395-497: A black market. Money may be exchangeable for a differing amount of the same currency if it has been acquired illegally and needs to be laundered before the money can be used. Counterfeit money may be sold for a lesser amount of genuine currency. The rate of exchange between a local and foreign currency may be subject to a black market, often described as a " parallel exchange rate " or similar terms. This may happen for one or more of several reasons: A government may officially set

474-468: A buyer for ancient manuscript fragments and artifacts. Certain items in the Schøyen Collection may have been acquired through the black market transactions which encourage further reckless destruction of ancient sites, illegal abuse of heritage sites, and the financing of terrorists or Civil War chieftains. Iraq and Afghanistan, for example, have sought a return of certain recently acquired items in

553-472: A foreign currency for the local currency. The U.S. dollar is viewed as a relatively stable and safe currency and is often used abroad as a second currency. In 2012, US$ 340 billion, roughly 37 percent of all U.S. currency, was believed to be circulating abroad. The most recent study of the amount of currency held overseas suggests that only 25 percent of U.S. currency was held abroad in 2014. The widespread substitution of U.S. currency for local currency

632-458: A good is a substitute or a complement depends on its relationship to other goods, rather than an intrinsic characteristic, and can be measured as cross elasticity of demand by employing statistical techniques such as covariance and correlation. Goods can be classified based on their degree of excludability and rivalry (competitiveness). Considering excludability can be measured on a continuous scale, some goods would not be able to fall into one of

711-463: A local art dealer named Ghassan Rihani, and through intermediaries purchased by the Collection. The Schøyen Collection then provided University College London the bowls for an academic study. Activists alleged in 2003 that the items were stolen from Iraq and illegally traded, and it must be returned to Iraq. The University set up a panel to investigate the claims in 2004, and the Schøyen Collection sued

790-403: A low-profit item for the rum-runners, and they moved on to smuggling Canadian whisky , French champagne , and English gin to major cities like New York City and Boston , where prices ran high. It was said that some ships carried $ 200,000 (roughly equivalent to US$ 4.5 million in 2022 ) in contraband in a single run. The United Kingdom has some of the highest taxes on tobacco products in

869-418: A mostly successful in excluding non-paying customer, but are still able to be consumed by non-paying consumers. An example of this is movies, books or video games that could be easily pirated and shared for free. food, clothing, cars, parking spaces like movies, books, video games fish, timber, coal, free public transport cinemas, private parks, television, public transport to more users than what

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948-400: A person or group (e.g., a criminal gang) indicates to a store owner that they could protect her/his store from potential damage, damage that the same person or group would otherwise inflict, while the correlation of threat and protection may be more or less deniably veiled, distinguishing it from the more direct act of extortion . Racketeering is often associated with organized crime . The term

1027-408: A person sees from the time they wake up in their home, on their commute to work to their arrival at the workplace. Commodities may be used as a synonym for economic goods but often refer to marketable raw materials and primary products . Although common goods are tangible , certain classes of goods, such as information , only take intangible forms. For example, among other goods an apple

1106-522: A premium to acquire it. U.S. currency is viewed as a relatively stable store of value and, since it does not leave a paper trail, it is also a convenient medium of exchange for both illegal transactions and for unreported income both in the U.S. and abroad. More recently cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin have been used as a medium of exchange in black market transactions. Cryptocurrencies are sometimes favored over centralized currency due to their pseudonymous nature and their ability to be traded over

1185-401: A problem, such as for a problem that does not actually exist or that would not otherwise exist if the racket did not exist. Conducting a racket is called racketeering. The potential problem may be caused by the same party that offers to solve it, although that fact may be concealed, with the intent to engender continual patronage for the racketeer. An archetype is the protection racket , wherein

1264-718: A red dye in the UK, a green dye in Ireland). The saving is attractive enough to make for a black market in agricultural diesel, which was estimated in 2007 to cost the UK £350 million annually in lost tax. In countries including India and Nepal, the price of fuel is set by the government, and it is illegal to sell the fuel at a higher price. During the petrol crisis in Nepal, black marketing in fuel became common, especially during mass petrol shortage. At times, people queued for hours or even overnight to get fuel. Petrol pump operators were alleged to hoard

1343-462: A rise in the price of beef results in a decrease in the quantity of beef demanded, it is likely that the quantity of hamburger buns demanded will also drop, despite no change in buns' prices. This is because hamburger buns and beef (in Western culture) are complementary goods . Goods considered complements or substitutes are relative associations and should not be understood in a vacuum. The degree to which

1422-411: Is rent control and subsidized affordable housing , which provide housing below the market cost, there may be a black market for housing rentals. For instance, in the UK there is illegal subletting of social housing homes where the tenant illegally rents out the government-subsidized home at a higher rent. In Sweden, rental contracts with regulated rent can be bought on the black market, either from

1501-426: Is a service provided by an electric utility company. This service can only be experienced through the consumption of electrical energy , which is available in a variety of voltages and, in this case, is the economic goods produced by the electric utility company. While the service (namely, distribution of electrical energy) is a process that remains in its entirety in the ownership of the electric service provider,

1580-507: Is a tangible object, while news belongs to an intangible class of goods and can be perceived only by means of an instrument such as printers or television . Goods may increase or decrease their utility directly or indirectly and may be described as having marginal utility . Some things are useful, but not scarce enough to have monetary value , such as the Earth's atmosphere , these are referred to as ' free goods '. In normal parlance, "goods"

1659-538: Is always a plural word, but economists have long termed a single item of goods "a good". In economics, a bad is the opposite of a good. Ultimately, whether an object is a good or a bad depends on each individual consumer and therefore, not all goods are goods to all people. Goods' diversity allows for their classification into different categories based on distinctive characteristics, such as tangibility and (ordinal) relative elasticity. A tangible good like an apple differs from an intangible good like information due to

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1738-423: Is being paid for free-to-air, air, national defense, free and open-source software Goods are capable of being physically delivered to a consumer . Goods that are economic intangibles can only be stored, delivered, and consumed by means of media . Goods, both tangibles and intangibles, may involve the transfer of product ownership to the consumer. Services do not normally involve transfer of ownership of

1817-416: Is difficult. Low-tax states are generally the major tobacco producers, and have come under criticism for their reluctance to increase taxes. North Carolina eventually agreed to raise its taxes from 5 cents to 35 cents per pack of 20 cigarettes, although this remains far below the national average. As of 2010 , South Carolina has refused to follow suit and raise taxes from seven cents per pack (the lowest in

1896-488: Is illegal or highly regulated in some countries. This demonstrates the underground economy, because of consistent high demand from customers, relatively high pay, but labor-intensive and low-skilled work, which attracts a continual supply of workers. While prostitution exists in every country, studies show that it tends to flourish more in poorer countries, and in areas with large numbers of unattached men, such as around military bases. For instance, an empirical study showed that

1975-567: Is known as de facto dollarisation , and has been observed in transition countries such as Cambodia and in some Latin American countries. Some countries, such as Ecuador, abandoned their local currency and used U.S. dollars, essentially for this reason, a process known as de jure dollarization (see also the example of the Ghanaian cedi from the 1970s and 1980s). If foreign currency is difficult or illegal for local citizens to acquire, they will pay

2054-425: Is likely to be part of a family of substitute goods ; for example, as pen prices rise, consumers might buy more pencils instead. An inelastic good is one for which there are few or no substitutes, such as tickets to major sporting events, original works by famous artists, and prescription medicine such as insulin. Complementary goods are generally more inelastic than goods in a family of substitutes. For example, if

2133-494: Is no single underground economy; there are many. These underground economies are omnipresent, existing in market-oriented as well as in centrally planned nations, be they developed or developing. Those engaged in underground activities circumvent, escape, or are excluded from the institutional system of rules, rights, regulations, and enforcement penalties that govern formal agents engaged in production and exchange. Different types of underground activities are distinguished according to

2212-401: Is not. Unrecorded income is a particular problem in transition countries that switched from a socialist accounting system to UN standard national accounting . New methods have been proposed for estimating the size of the unrecorded (non-observed) economy. However little consensus exists on the size of the unreported economies of transitional countries. The " informal economy " circumvents

2291-487: Is often associated with money laundering , a process used to conceal the illegitimate source of the money. Because of the clandestine nature of the black economy, it is not possible to determine its size and scope. The literature on the black market has not established a common terminology and has instead offered many synonyms including subterranean, hidden, grey , shadow, informal, clandestine, illegal, unobserved, unreported, unrecorded, second, parallel, and black. There

2370-428: Is purchased on the black market". Smuggling one truckload of cigarettes from a low-tax U.S. state to a high-tax state can result in a profit of up to $ 3 million. Because traffic crossing U.S. state borders is not usually stopped or inspected to the same extent as happens at the country's international borders, interdicting this sort of smuggling (especially without causing major disruption to interstate commerce)

2449-434: Is required to obtain it. In contrast, free goods , such as air, are naturally in abundant supply and need no conscious effort to obtain them. Private goods are things owned by people, such as televisions , living room furniture, wallets, cellular telephones, almost anything owned or used on a daily basis that is not food-related. A consumer good or "final good" is any item that is ultimately consumed, rather than used in

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2528-422: Is to say, consuming some goods will deprive another consumer of the ability to consume the goods. Private goods are the most common type of goods. They include what you have to get from the store. For examples food, clothing, cars, parking spaces, etc. An individual who consumes an apple denies another individual from consuming the same one. It is excludable because consumption is only offered to those willing to pay

2607-422: Is traded. Goods and services acquired illegally and/or transacted for in an illegal manner may exchange above or below the price of legal market transactions: No government, no global nonprofit, no multinational enterprise can seriously claim to be able to replace the 1.8 billion jobs created by the economic underground. In truth, the best hope for growth in most emerging economies lies in the shadows. Even when

2686-451: Is usually responsible for public goods and common goods, and enterprises are generally responsible for the production of private and club goods, although this is not always the case. In 1977, Nobel winner Elinor Ostrom and her husband Vincent Ostrom proposed additional modifications to the existing classification of goods so to identify fundamental differences that affect the incentives facing individuals. Their definitions are presented on

2765-570: The Internet . Within the European single market , it is legal for a person or business to buy fuel in one EU state for use in a vehicle in another, as well as a small amount of fuel in a container, but as with other goods, taxes (such as VAT ) will generally be payable by the final customer at the physical place of making the purchase. When fuel is transported across borders for resale, such taxes can often be recovered and then relevant taxes are payable in

2844-551: The PBS documentary Prohibition , the term "bootlegging" was popularized when thousands of city dwellers would sell liquor from flasks they kept in their bootleg all across major cities and rural areas. The term "rum-running" most likely originated at the start of Prohibition in the United States (1920–1933), when ships from Bimini in the western Bahamas transported cheap Caribbean rum to Florida speakeasies . Rum's cheapness made it

2923-408: The government , or included in the gross national product (GNP), unlike the formal economy. In developed countries, the informal sector is characterized by unreported employment . This is hidden from the state for tax, social security, or labour law purposes but is legal in other aspects. The term black market can also be used in reference to a specific part of the economy in which contraband

3002-577: The Schøyen Collection. The Collection states that it "strongly supports a tough regime for cultural protection", makes active effort towards pro-active compliance with the law and is an "ethical private collector in preserving the heritage of all mankind". This concern has also been raised about the provenance of various cuneiform materials held by the Schøyen Collection that are considered by some to be tainted cultural property. The 654 Aramaic incantation bowls were alleged to belong to Iraq, alleged to have been stolen after August 1990, taken to Jordan, resold by

3081-401: The U.S. if aged less than 60 days. Rum-running , or bootlegging, is the illegal business of transporting ( smuggling ) alcoholic beverages where such transportation is forbidden by law. Smuggling is usually done to circumvent taxation or prohibition laws. The term rum-running is more commonly applied to smuggling over water; bootlegging is applied to smuggling over land. According to

3160-551: The USA). According to the World Health Organization (WHO), illegal organ trade occurs when organs are removed from the body for the purpose of commercial transactions. The WHO justifies its stance on the issue by stating, "Payment for... organs is likely to take unfair advantage of the poorest and most vulnerable groups, undermines altruistic donation and leads to profiteering and human trafficking." Despite prohibitions, it

3239-567: The University for the bowls. The Schøyen Collection denied that these bowls were stolen or smuggled, providing official documents issued by the government of Jordan as evidence that the Jordanian source owned it prior to 1965. University College London settled, paid an undisclosed amount in compensation, suppressed its own report on the provenance of the bowls, and returned the items back to the Schøyen Collection. The Schøyen Collection preserves some of

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3318-630: The ability of others to consume them. Examples in addition to the ones in the matrix are national parks, or firework displays. It is generally accepted by mainstream economists that the market mechanism will under-provide public goods, so these goods have to be produced by other means, including government provision. Public goods can also suffer from the Free-Rider problem . Private goods are excludable goods, which prevent other consumers from consuming them. Private goods are also rivalrous because one good in private ownership cannot be used by someone else. That

3397-598: The act of theft to be in the profits forgone to the pirates. However, this makes the unsubstantiated assumption that the pirates would have bought the copyrighted material if it had not been available through file sharing or other means. Copyright holders also say that they did work creating their copyrighted material and they wish to get compensated for their work. No other system than copyright has been found to compensate artists and other creators for their work, and many artists do not have an alternative source of income or another job. Many artists and film producers have accepted

3476-452: The addition of new customers without infringing on existing customers viewing abilities. This would also mean that marginal cost would be close to zero, which satisfies the criteria for a good to be considered non-rival. However, access to cable TV services is only available to consumers willing to pay the price, demonstrating the excludability aspect. Economists set these categories for these goods and their impact on consumers. The government

3555-523: The black market include consumer-to-consumer online auction websites and private pages on social media websites. In black market venues in Cambodia, sex toys have been seized alongside aphrodisiac products. It has been suggested that if efforts in North America to ban realistic-looking sexbots succeed, it may result in a black market. People engaged in the black market may run their business hidden behind

3634-545: The consumption. That is, not everyone can use the good, but when one individual has claim to use it, they do not reduce the amount or the ability for others to consume the good. By joining a specific club or organization we can obtain club goods; As a result, some people are excluded because they are not members. Examples in addition to the ones in the matrix are cable television, golf courses, and any merchandise provided to club members. A large television service provider would already have infrastructure in place which would allow for

3713-423: The costs of, and is excluded from the benefits and rights incorporated in, the laws and administrative rules covering property relationships, commercial licensing, labor contracts, torts, financial credit, and social security systems. A summary measure of the informal economy is the income generated by economic agents that operate informally. The informal sector is part of an economy that is not taxed , monitored by

3792-610: The country of sale, but there are no customs checks on borders between countries within the European Union Customs Union . Differences in tax rates can thus lead to opportunities for arbitrage even when prices before tax are equal, in a form that is illegal as a form of tax evasion . For example, between the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland , there has often been a black market for petrol and diesel . The direction of smuggling can change depending on variation in

3871-488: The courts, as the operations are distributed and widespread, traversing national borders and thus legal systems. Since digital information can be duplicated repeatedly with no loss of quality, and passed on electronically at little to no cost, the effective underground market value of media is zero, differentiating it from nearly all other forms of underground economic activity. The issue is compounded by widespread indifference to enforcing copyright law, both with governments and

3950-633: The current tenant or sometimes directly from the property owner. Specialized black-market dealers assist the property owners with such transactions. Items such as medicines as well as essential aircraft and automobile parts (e.g. brakes, motor parts, etc.) are counterfeited on a large scale. Street vendors in countries where there is little enforcement of copyright law , particularly in Asia and Latin America, often sell copies of films , music CDs , and computer software such as video games , sometimes even before

4029-575: The demand for such drugs and profit margins encourage new distributors to enter the market. Drug legalization activists draw parallels between the illegal drug trade and the Prohibition of alcohol in the United States in the 1920s. The laws of many countries forbid or restrict the personal ownership of weapons . These restrictions can range from small knives to firearms , either altogether or by classification (e.g., caliber , handguns , automatic weapons , and explosives ). The black market supplies

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4108-773: The demands for weaponry that cannot be obtained legally or may only be obtained legally after obtaining permits and paying fees. This may be by smuggling the arms from countries where they were bought legally or stolen, or by stealing from arms manufacturers within the country itself, using insiders. In cases where the underground economy is unable to smuggle firearms, they can also satisfy requests by gunsmithing their own firearms. Those who may buy this way include criminals to use for illegal activities, gun collectors, and otherwise law-abiding citizens interested in protecting their dwellings, families, or businesses. In England and Wales, certain categories of weapons used for hunting may be owned by qualified residents but must be registered with

4187-645: The four common categories used. There are four types of goods based on the characteristics of rival in consumption and excludability: Public Goods, Private Goods, Common Resources, and Club Goods. These four types plus examples for anti-rivalry appear in the accompanying table. Goods that are both non-rival and non-excludable are called public goods . In many cases, renewable resources, such as land, are common commodities but some of them are contained in public goods. Public goods are non-exclusive and non-competitive, meaning that individuals cannot be stopped from using them and anyone can consume this good without hindering

4266-462: The fuel and sell it to black marketeers. Black marketing in vehicle/cooking fuel became widespread during the 2015 Nepal blockade ; even after it was eased and petrol imports resumed, people were not getting the fuel as intended, and resorted to the black market. In some countries including Saudi Arabia, Thailand, and India sex toys are illegal, and are sold illegally, without compliance with regulations on safety, etc. Platforms used to sell sex toys on

4345-433: The impossibility of a person to physically hold the latter, whereas the former occupies physical space. Intangible goods differ from services in that final (intangible) goods are transferable and can be traded, whereas a service cannot. Price elasticity also differentiates types of goods. An elastic good is one for which there is a relatively large change in quantity due to a relatively small change in price, and therefore

4424-457: The legal requirements or procedures—health checks, standards of accommodation, and so on. In other countries, such as Nicaragua , where legal prostitution is regulated, hotels may require both parties to identify themselves, to prevent child prostitution . Personally identifying information , financial information like credit card and bank account information, and medical data are bought and sold, mostly in darknet markets . People increase

4503-468: The local police force and kept within a locked cabinet. Among those who may purchase weapons on the black market are people who are unable to pass the legal requirements for registration—convicted felons or those suffering from mental illness for example. The illegal logging of timber , according to Interpol , is an industry worth almost as much as the drug production industry in some countries. In many developing countries, living animals are captured in

4582-496: The matrix. Elinor Ostrom proposed additional modifications to the classification of goods to identify fundamental differences that affect the incentives facing individuals Consumption can be extended to include "Anti-rivalrous" consumption. The additional definition matrix shows the four common categories alongside providing some examples of fully excludable goods, Semi-excludable goods and fully non-excludeable goods. Semi-excludable goods can be considered goods or services that

4661-466: The official release of the title. A determined counterfeiter with a few hundred dollars can make copies that are digitally identical to an original with no loss in quality; innovations in consumer DVD and CD writers and the widespread availability of cracks on the Internet for most forms of copy protection technology make this cheap and easy to do. Copyright-holders and other proponents of copyright laws have found this phenomenon hard to stop through

4740-451: The oldest known archaeological discoveries and manuscripts. Black market A black market , underground economy , shadow market or shadow economy is a clandestine market or series of transactions that has some aspect of illegality or is not compliant with an institutional set of rules. If the rule defines the set of goods and services whose production and distribution are prohibited or restricted by law, non-compliance with

4819-446: The particular institutional rules that they violate: The "illegal economy" consists of economic activities pursued in violation of legal statutes that define the scope of legitimate forms of commerce. Illegal-economy participants produce and distribute prohibited goods and services , such as drugs , weapons , and prostitution . The "unreported economy" circumvents or evades institutionally established fiscal rules as codified in

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4898-479: The price. Common-pool resources are rival in consumption and non-excludable. An example is that of fisheries, which harvest fish from a shared common resource pool of fish stock. Fish caught by one group of fishermen are no longer accessible to another group, thus being rivalrous. However, oftentimes, due to an absence of well-defined property rights , it is difficult to restrict access to fishermen who may overfish. Club goods are excludable but not rivalrous in

4977-657: The production of another good. For example, a microwave oven or a bicycle that is sold to a consumer is a final good or consumer good, but the components that are sold to be used in those goods are intermediate goods . For example, textiles or transistors can be used to make some further goods. Commercial goods are construed as tangible products that are manufactured and then made available for supply to be used in an industry of commerce. Commercial goods could be tractors, commercial vehicles, mobile structures, airplanes, and even roofing materials. Commercial and personal goods as categories are very broad and cover almost everything

5056-495: The public at large. Additionally, not all people agree with copyright laws, on the grounds that they unfairly criminalize competition, allowing the copyright-holder to effectively monopolize related industries. Copyright-holders also may use region-coding to discriminate against selected populations price-wise and availability-wise. Copyright infringement law goes as far as to deem illegal " mixtapes " and other such material copied to tape or disk. Copyright holders typically attest

5135-488: The rate of exchange of its currency with that of other, "harder" currencies. When it does so, the peg may overvalue the local currency relative to what its market value would be if it were a floating currency . Those in possession of the harder currency, for example, expatriate workers, may be able to use the black market to buy the local currency at better exchange rates than they can get officially. In situations of financial instability and inflation, citizens may substitute

5214-453: The role of piracy in media distribution. The spread of material through file sharing is a source of publicity for artists and builds fan bases that may be inclined to see the performer live (live performances make up the bulk of successful artists' revenues, however not all artists can make live performances, for example, photographers typically only have a single source of income: the licensing of their photos). Money itself may be subject to

5293-589: The rule constitutes a black-market trade since the transaction itself is illegal. Such transactions include the illegal drug trade , prostitution (where prohibited), illegal currency transactions, and human trafficking . Participants try to hide their illegal behavior from the government or regulatory authority. Cash is the preferred medium of exchange in illegal transactions, since cash transactions are less easily traced. Common motives for operating in black markets are to trade contraband, avoid taxes and regulations, or evade price controls or rationing. Typically,

5372-414: The service itself, but may involve transfer of ownership of goods developed or marketed by a service provider in the course of the service. For example, sale of storage related goods, which could consist of storage sheds, storage containers, storage buildings as tangibles or storage supplies such as boxes, bubble wrap, tape, bags and the like which are consumables, or distributing electricity among consumers

5451-650: The supply of prostitutes rose abruptly in Denver and Minneapolis in 2008 when the Democratic and Republican National Conventions took place there. Prostitutes in the black market generally operate with some degree of secrecy, sometimes negotiating prices and activities through codewords and subtle gestures. In countries such as Germany or the Netherlands , where prostitution is legal but regulated, illegal prostitutes exist whose services are offered more cheaply without regard for

5530-424: The tax code. A summary measure of the unreported economy is the amount of income that should be reported to the tax authority but is not so reported. A complementary measure of the unreported economy is the " tax gap ": the difference between the amount of tax revenues due the fiscal authority and the amount of tax revenue actually collected. In the U.S. unreported income is estimated to be $ 2 trillion resulting in

5609-510: The taxes and the exchange rate between the Republic's euro (and previously punt ) and Northern Ireland's pound sterling ; indeed sometimes diesel will be smuggled in one direction and petrol the other. In some countries, diesel fuel for agricultural vehicles or domestic use is taxed at a much lower rate than that for other vehicles. This is known as dyed fuel , because a colored dye is added so it can be detected if used in other vehicles (e.g.

5688-493: The taxicab market with a medallion system (taxicabs must get a special license and display it on a medallion in the vehicle). In most such jurisdictions it is legal to sell the medallions, but the limited supply and resulting high prices of medallions have led to a market in unlicensed carpooling / illegal taxicab operation . In Baltimore , Maryland , for example, it is not uncommon for private individuals to provide illegal taxicab service for city residents. In places where there

5767-499: The totality of such activity is referred to with the definite article, e.g., " the black market in bush meat". The black market is distinct from the grey market , in which commodities are distributed through channels that, while legal, are unofficial, unauthorized, or unintended by the original manufacturer, and the white market, in which trade is legal and official. Black money is the proceeds of an illegal transaction, on which income and other taxes have not been paid. Black money

5846-600: The underground market offers lower prices, consumers may still buy on the legal market when possible, because: However, in some situations, consumers may conclude that they are better off using black market services, particularly when government regulations hinder what would otherwise be a legitimate competitive service. For example, in Baltimore , many consumers actively prefer illegal taxi cabs, citing that they are more available, convenient, and fairly priced. Some examples of underground economic activities include: Prostitution

5925-420: The value of the stolen data by aggregating it with publicly available data, and selling it again for a profit, increasing the damage that can be done to the people whose data was stolen. From the late 19th and early 20th centuries, many countries began to ban the possession or use of some recreational drugs , such as in the United States' war on drugs . Many people nonetheless continue to use illegal drugs, and

6004-460: The wild and sold as pets. Wild animals are also hunted and killed for their meat , hide, and organs, the latter of which and other animal parts are sold for use in traditional medicine. In several states in the United States , laws requiring the pasteurization of milk have created black markets in raw milk , and sometimes in raw milk cheese which is legal in a number of EU countries but banned in

6083-592: The world and strict limits on the amount of tobacco that can be imported duty-free from other countries, leading to widespread attempts to smuggle relatively cheap tobacco from low tax countries into the U.K. Such smuggling efforts range from vacationers concealing relatively small quantities of tobacco in their luggage to large-scale enterprises linked to organized crime . British authorities have aggressively tried to detect and confiscate such illegal imports, and to prosecute those caught. Nevertheless, it has been reported that "27% of cigarettes and 68% of roll your own tobacco

6162-567: Was coined by the Employers' Association of Chicago in June 1927 in a statement about the influence of organized crime in the Teamsters union. Where taxicabs, buses, and other transportation providers are strictly regulated or monopolized by government, a black market typically flourishes to provide transportation to poorly served or overpriced communities. In the United States, some cities restrict entry to

6241-412: Was estimated that 5% of all organ recipients engaged in commercial organ transplant in 2005. Research indicates that illegal organ trade is on the rise, with a recent report by Global Financial Integrity estimating that the illegal organ trade generates profits between $ 600 million and $ 1.2 billion per year across many countries. A racket is a service that is fraudulently offered to solve

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