According to politicians across all parties, something called the “hidden economy” – the shadowy nethers of the labour market, in which work goes unregulated and undeclared to the authorities – is a “menace”, full of migrants whose illegal working “undercuts British workers”, and even a threat to our national security. MPs have been so worried about asylum seekers delivering their Friday night pizza that they’ve spent parliamentary time discussing Deliveroo et al’s business models. In response, the government has repeatedly reassured us, in the somewhat Mills & Boon-style phrasing of Yvette Cooper, when she was home secretary, that it’s “surging enforcement” to tackle the problem.

Solutions suggested include Keir Starmer’s digital ID cards, requirements for increased “right to work” checks, and new data-sharing agreements in which the Home Office gives delivery companies the addresses of asylum hotels to try to stop asylum seekers working. All of these measures are intended to stop migrants earning money if they lack the legal right to work, which suggests that the government thinks those migrants are the main problem in the hidden economy.

But the government’s own commissioned research on the issue suggests something very different. Reports in 2011, 2017 and 2023 laid out the facts of the UK’s hidden economy, meaning work that is in legal sectors but that people are failing to register for regulatory or tax purposes (rather than illicit activities, such as drug-dealing and sex work,........

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