Is Belgium really like Sicily, home of The Mafia?

My husband and I honeymooned in Sicily a few years back. Sicilians were friendlier than most Belgians, but their driving was about the same — frighteningly bad.

Not just bad driving

But bad driving is not the only thing that Belgium has in common with Sicily. Belgium's politicians have developed a rather juicy reputation for themselves, the most recent example being Antwerp's politicians buying themselves treats with government-issue credit cards.

But this article is not about conspiracy theories nor corrupt politicians - it's about the phenomenon of non-taxed work in Belgium. Little, clean, modest Belgium has as big an underground economy as the country that spawned the Mafia.

Other Europeans know quite well that Belgians frequently do their deals under the table. It didn't take me long to figure that out either: I was fresh off the plane when I learned of a distant family member who worked one day per week “in the black”.

Everyone talked about his “extra” work as being perfectly normal, and there was no sense of shame or need to whisper when talking about it. After all, normal is whatever you are used to.

"We're in the same league as Italy"

Leo Van Hove, Assistant Professor of Economics at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel, made a monetary study of the underground economy of Belgium as part of his 1997 doctoral thesis.

In order to track how much untrackable money is circulating through Belgium's economy, Van Hove studied the amount and composition of bank notes in circulation in 1991.

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