Self-employment, wage employment, and informality in a developing economy

We construct a simple model incorporating various urban labour market phenom-ena obtaining in developing economies, and we give a diagrammatic formulation of the market equilibrium. Our initial formulation assumes an integrated labour market and allows for entrepreneurship, self-employment, and wage employment. We then introduce labour market segmentation. In equilibrium voluntary and involuntary self-employment, formal and informal wage employment, and formal and informal entrepreneurship may all coexist. We illustrate the model by an example calibrated on Latin American data, examining individual labour market transitions and implica-tions of education/training and labour market policies. JEL classifications: O17, J23 1