Changes to the Methodology, 2004 - 2008

Changes to the Methodology in 2008

The Doing Business data are collected in a standardized way. To start, the Doing Business team, with academic advisers, designs a survey. The survey uses a simple business case to ensure comparability across economies and over time -- with assumptions about the legal form of the business, its size, its location and the nature of its operations. Surveys are administered through more than 6,700 local experts, including lawyers, business consultants, accountants, freight forwarders, government officials and other professionals routinely administering or advising on legal and regulatory requirements (table 12.1). These experts have several (typically 4) rounds of interaction with the Doing Business team, involving conference calls, written correspondence and visits by the team. For Doing Business 2009 team members visited 73 economies to verify data and recruit respondents. The data from surveys are subjected to numerous tests for robustness, which lead to revisions or expansions of the information collected.

The Doing Business methodology offers several advantages. It is transparent, using factual information about what laws and regulations say and allowing multiple interactions with local respondents to clarify potential misinterpretations of questions. Having representative samples of respondents is not an issue, as the texts of the relevant laws and regulations are collected and answers checked for accuracy. The methodology is inexpensive and easily replicable, so data can be collected in a large sample of economies. Because standard assumptions are used in the data collection, comparisons and benchmarks are valid across economies. Finally, the data not only highlight the extent of specific regulatory obstacles to doing business but also identify their source and point to what might be reformed.

Limits to what is measured
The Doing Business methodology has 5 limitations that should be considered when interpreting the data. First, the collected data refer to businesses in the economy’s largest business city and may not be representative of regulation in other parts of the economy. To address this limitation, subnational Doing Business indicators were created for 6 economies in 2007/08: China, Colombia, Egypt, Morocco, Nigeria and the Philippines. Six other subnational studies are under way, in Central Asia, Southeast Europe, Indonesia, the Russian Federation, Southeast Asia and Ukraine. And some existing studies are updated annually, such as those in India, Mexico and Pakistan. These subnational studies point to significant differences in the speed of reform and the ease of doing business across cities in the same economy.

Second, the data often focus on a specific business form -- generally a limited liability company (or its legal equivalent) of a specified size -- and may not be representative of the regulation on other businesses, for example, sole proprietorships. Third, transactions described in a standardized case scenario refer to a specific set of issues and may not represent the full set of issues a business encounters. Fourth, the measures of time involve an element of judgment by the expert respondents. When sources indicate different estimates, the time indicators reported in Doing Business represent the median values of several responses given under the assumptions of the standardized case.

Finally, the methodology assumes that a business has full information on what is required and does not waste time when completing procedures. In practice, completing a procedure may take longer if the business lacks information or is unable to follow up promptly.

Alternatively, the business may choose to disregard some burdensome procedures. For both reasons the time delays reported in Doing Business 2009 could differ from the experiences of entrepreneurs reported in the World Bank Enterprise Surveys.

Changes in what is measured
The methodology for one of the Doing Business topics -- getting credit -- improved this year. Three main changes were made, affecting only the strength of legal rights index. First, a standardized case scenario with specific assumptions was introduced to bring this indicator into line with other Doing Business indicators. Second, the indicator now focuses not on tangible movable collateral, such as equipment, but on revolving movable collateral, such as accounts receivable and inventory. Third, the indicator no longer considers whether management remains in place during a reorganization procedure, better accommodating economies that adopt reorganization procedures similar to Chapter 11 reorganization or redressement procedures in civil law systems.

Data challenges and revisions
Most laws and regulations underlying the Doing Business data are available on the Doing Business website. All the sample surveys and the details underlying the indicators are also published on the website. Find answers to many questions about the methodology on our FAQ page.

Doing Business publishes 8,900 indicators each year. To create these indicators, the team measures more than 52,000 data points, each of which is made available on the Doing Business website. Data time series for each indicator and economy are available on the website, beginning with the first year the indicator or economy was included in the report. To provide a comparable time series for research, the data set is back-calculated to adjust for changes in methodology and any revisions in data due to corrections. The website also makes available all original data sets used for background papers. The correction rate between Doing Business 2008 and Doing Business 2009 was 6%.

Changes to the Methodology in 2007

The methodology for three of the Doing Business topics -- dealing with licenses, employing workers and enforcing contracts -- was improved in Doing Business 2007. For dealing with licenses, three changes were made. First, the case study now applies to builders that are fully licensed and insured at the start of the project. As a result, procedures that involve insuring or licensing the construction business are no longer counted. Second, inspections are now assumed to take 1 day to complete even where there is a delay between the request for an inspection and its occurrence. This change was made to eliminate discretion in interpreting the time that respondents report for inspections. Third, preconstruction inspections were added to the list of procedures; these affect mainly countries in the former Soviet Union. The first two changes reduce the number of procedures and delays associated with the case study; the third increases them.

For employing workers, improvements were made to align the Doing Business methodology with International Labour Organization (ILO) conventions. It is now possible for an economy to receive the highest score on the ease of employing workers --indicating the most flexible labor regulations -- and comply with all 187 ILO conventions. Two main changes were made. First, the calculation of firing costs was modified so that 8 or fewer weeks of salary now receives a score of 0 for purposes of calculating the rankings on the ease of employing workers. Second, restrictions on night work such as higher overtime premiums or limitations on scheduling work hours are no longer coded as rigidities. Both changes result in more flexibility in employment regulations as coded in Doing Business.

For enforcing contracts, the list of procedures was revised to accommodate procedural differences between civil and common law. For example, in civil law countries the judge appoints an independent expert, while in common law countries parties send the court a list of their expert witnesses. Two assumptions were added, on attaching the defendant’s goods prior to judgment and on providing expert opinions. To indicate the overall efficiency of court procedures, 1 procedure is now subtracted for countries that have specialized commercial courts and 1 procedure for countries that allow electronic filing of court cases. Finally, the cost indicator now includes all fees for enforcing judgments.


Changes to the Methodology in 2006

The methodology for four of the Doing Business topics changed for Doing Business 2007. For paying taxes, the total tax rate measure now includes all labor contributions paid by the employer (such as social security contributions) and excludes consumption taxes (such as sales tax or value added tax). And the measure is now expressed as a percentage of commercial profits rather than gross profits. This change reflects the total tax burden borne by businesses. For enforcing contracts, the case study was revised to reflect a typical contractual dispute over the quality of goods rather than a simple debt default. For trading across borders, Doing Business now reports the cost associated with exporting and importing cargo in addition to the time and number of documents required. And for employing workers, hiring costs are no longer included in the calculation of the ease of employing workers.


Changes to the Methodology in 2005

In 2005, in addition to developing new indicators on dealing with licenses, trading across borders and paying taxes, the indicators on two other topics were expanded.

Firstly, changes were made to the protecting investors indicators. The disclosure index in Doing Business in 2005 captured seven ways of enhancing disclosure: whether laws and regulations require reporting (i) family; (ii) indirect and (iii) beneficial ownership; (iv) disclosing information on voting agreements between shareholders; (v) audit committees to the board of directors; (vi) use of external auditors; and (vii) ownership and financial information is publicly available to all current and potential investors. The strength of investor protection index in Doing Business in 2006 -- comprising the extent of disclosure index, the extent of directors liability index, and the ease of shareholder suit index -- targeted the indicator set on the specific issue of self-dealing within corporations. The new approach provides a more focused, in-depth understanding of each country’s legal protections against corporate looting.

Secondly, the indicators on employing workers were expanded to include the non-salary cost of hiring a worker, which consists of all social security and payroll taxes paid by an employer on behalf of a worker.


Changes to the Methodology in 2004

Changes were made to every set of indicators in 2004. For example, previously the statutory requirement for minimum capital was taken as part of the initial cost of starting a business. But in a number of countries, only a part of the mandated minimum capital needs to be paid up-front, with the rest paid over time. For example, only 25% is paid upfront in Germany, 30% in Italy and 50% in Armenia. The revised indicator reflects the up-front cost only.

Indicators of credit markets were also improved. In 2003 we reported a measure of the legal rights of creditors in insolvency. In 2004, the measure is expanded to cover collateral laws as well -- which define legal rights that help both borrowers and lenders. And indicators on credit information were simplified to an index of six variables, covering information sharing from both public and privately owned registries.

As another example, 2003’s methodology for enforcing a contract did not allow for a creditor to seek recovery outside the courts. This assumption was made in the belief that such actions may always be reversed by a later court judgment and are not preferred by creditors. But several countries -- for example, Belgium, France and Greece—have administrative debt collection procedures that are binding for both debtors and creditors. In 2004, administrative procedures are used for countries where the respondents indicate they are the most common method.

A different problem arises when the respondents describe how entrepreneurs would register a business, go to court or enter bankruptcy -- but in reality have dealt little with such transactions. To gauge their experience, this year’s surveys collected information on how many such transactions the respondent completed. The new evidence shows that the average incorporation lawyer dealt with more than 100 cases of business entry in 2003. And because Doing Business has about 500 respondents on starting a business, the data reported here reflect experience with more than 50,000 transactions for the whole sample -- for only one of the topics in Doing Business. Beyond the arithmetic, a professional dealing with these issues every day can differentiate between usual costs and delays and those under extraordinary circumstances.

To inspire reform, indicators need to be simple. Changes to the methodology have been made where users of the indicators said they had trouble understanding them. For example, 2003's indices on the rigidity of employment regulation were based on a reading of the laws and varied from 0 (less rigid regulation) to 100 (more rigid regulation). Many business people asked whether the indices could be presented in terms of costs. So in 2004, a new indicator on the cost of firing a redundant worker has been constructed, measured in terms of weeks of wages.

For another example, 2003's indicators on the difficulty of closing a business looked at the cost, time, priority of claims and extent of court involvement. Policymakers have said that they are most concerned about how much value is being lost in inefficient bankruptcy procedures. The result is a new indicator, which calculates how many cents on the dollar can be recovered in bankruptcy.

Once the simple indicator triggers interest in reform, by comparing it with those for other countries and by showing the economic and social benefits of improvement, more detailed information collected by the Doing Business team can be used to assist the reformers. One example is the indicators on registering property. Once the government of Malawi acknowledges the need to make registration more efficient, the depth of the analysis allows further investigation of where the reform should focus. In particular, the third procedure -- the requirement to obtain consent from the minister of lands for the property transfer -- is the largest bottleneck to registering property. Cutting this procedure would reduce the time by 75%.

Data have also been collected on the actual use of courts in filing for bankruptcy. This is a first attempt to measure use of public institutions and hence the relevance of bankruptcy laws for the average business. The result: in 40 countries bankruptcy is hardly ever used. The analysis of such data helps in setting priorities for reform and in designing improvements to indicators. The 2004 data set presents new indicators on collateral laws to address how creditors enforce their rights outside of bankruptcy.