Drugs wordt en is bijna altijd geassocieerd met criminaliteit, een stelling die ook op gaat voor hoeren. Maar volgens een Engels onderzoek zijn hoeren en drugs samen juist goed voor meer dan tien miljoen Engelse pond, wat weer terug vloeit in de economie. Want laten we eerlijk zijn als je een beetje dealer of pooier bent moet je er wel erg slick bij lopen met een nieuwe ketting en sneakers. Maar goed het hele artikel kan je hier lezen.
The Office for National Statistics, which has to calculate the figure, confirmed it at an economic forum last week and will publish more details next month. It will be £3bn from prostitution and £7bn from illegal drugs.
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Small DataThe European Union has declared that illegal activities need to be included in national accounts so that comparisons can be made between countries. In the Netherlands, for example, some drugs are permitted that are illegal elsewhere in Europe, and there is legal prostitution. Given that the allocation of the EU budget is based on the size of a country’s economy measured by gross domestic product (GDP), the EU wants to be sure that all countries are measuring it in the same way.
The inclusion of illegal activities in GDP is one of a range of changes to the national accounts which will be introduced across Europe from September. The activities involved are only supposed to be those in which both parties are, at least nominally, voluntary participants.
At first that will only include UK production of cannabis, drug smuggling and prostitution, but it is expected that illegal employment, gambling, pirating of software and fencing of stolen goods will also eventually be included. The European statistics authority Eurostat has brought out extensive guidelines on measuring illegal activities. It says we must assume that all illegal drugs and prostitution services are consumed by households and not businesses.
