The Underground Economy Index (IES) - calculated by the Brazilian Institute of Economics of Fundação Getulio Vargas (IBRE/FGV) in partnership with the Brazilian Institute for Ethical Competition (ETCO) - reached the 15.9% mark in 2013, which represents a 0.8 percentage point reduction compared to the previous year. This is one of the results from a survey published this Tuesday, November 26th. The absolute estimate is that such economy, which includes the production of goods and services not reported to the government and that remains uncovered by national GDP, will exceed the BRL 760 billion mark this year.According to IBRE researcher, Fernando de Holanda Barbosa Filho, the informality decrease signaled by the indicator is a reflection of the situation lived by the Brazilian formal labor market. The employment formalization process in the country has come to stay. Factors such as the increasingly lower population growth, with the decrease in the number of people in the labor market as a result, influence unemployment reduction and a low rate of unemployment benefits the reduction of informality, he says.He also recalls the influence exerted by the increase of the general education level of Brazilians in the reduction of informality. Between 2001 and 2011 there was an increase of 22 million people with formal education, says Barbosa Filho. But despite the positive reading, we must consider that the unexpected acceleration of informality reduction may be rooted in other isolated factors, as is the case of tax reductions over temporary payroll for some sectors of the economy. Theoretically, tax reductions over payroll should have an impact on informality, but it is still not possible to confirm or make an analysis of the direct impact of this measure on informality, warns the researcher.