If you have Brazilian friends — “Yah, I be dere at eight, my friend!” — it should come as no surprise that In Brazil, Thicket Of Red Tape Spoils Recipe for Growth:
Brazil could add half a percentage point to its output — translating into some 160,000 jobs — simply by reducing the licensing time for new businesses from the current 152 days to Chile’s level of 27 days. In the U.S., according to the World Bank, the waiting time is just five days.
The natural consequences:
A study by Brazil’s small-business association found that 70% of entrepreneurs who try to open a business legally never conclude a process that requires about 100 different documents. Most simply operate off the books in an underground economy that’s nearly half the size of the country’s official output. Endemic tax evasion, in turn, increases the burden on the narrow base of law-abiding taxpayers, who get hit with 61 different taxes and an aggregate tax burden of more than 35% — about twice that of Mexico, China or India. A new tax regulation is issued, on average, every 40 minutes.