Russia's Corruption Generates Equivalent Of 50% GDP

More interesting details: http://www.itar-tass.com/eng/level2.html?NewsID=15369167&...

"The corruption situation is so dramatic that the report authors singled out corruption-related losses of Russian economy. They estimated these losses at about 50% expenses of Russian businesspeople. Some 80% of current assets in the education system are shadowy, that is to say mainly related to the corruption, and this figure reaches 90% in state and municipal services."

Interesting story - but did anyone else find this headline non-sensical? How can corruption generate a percent of GDP?

I'm guessing they meant 50% of GDP is in black markets, or that 50% of business expenses go to bribing people.

One component of GDP is "personal consumption". In Russia, if a large number of people are consuming black market goods, then the "actual" GDP is going to be much higher than the government-reported GDP.

Russia isn't the only country that has a large underground economy:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Underground_economy#Comparison_...

(The figures are a bit dated, but still interesting.)