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on Central and South America |
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Issue of 2022‒11‒07
nine papers chosen by |
| By: | Giménez-Nadal, José Ignacio; Velilla, Jorge; Ortega, Raquel |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the commuting behavior of employee and self-employed workers in urban areas of eleven Latin American countries, within a theoretical framework that identifies employees' excess commuting as different from self-employed workers' commuting. Using data from the ECAF data, results show that employees spend about 8.2 more minutes commuting to work than their self-employed counterparts, net of observable characteristics, a difference of around 18.5% of the employees' commuting time. This difference is qualitatively robust across the eleven countries and is concentrated in commutes by public transit, but it is not explained by differences in access to public transit services between the two groups. This analysis is a first exploration of self-employed and employee workers' commuting time in Latin American countries. By analyzing differences in commuting time between these two groups of Latin American workers, our analysis may serve to guide future planning programs. |
| Keywords: | commuting time,self-employment,Latin America,ECAF data |
| JEL: | R40 O57 |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:1179&r= |
| By: | Britto, Diogo (Bocconi University); Melo, Caíque (Bocconi University); Sampaio, Breno (Universidade Federal de Pernambuco) |
| Abstract: | We study the effects of parental job loss on children and how access to unemployment benefits can mitigate these impacts. We leverage unique nationwide data from Brazil linking multiple administrative datasets, and take a comprehensive approach studying impacts on education as well as other key dimensions of children's lives. First, leveraging mass layoffs for identification, we show that parental job loss increases school dropouts and age-grade distortion by up to 1.5 percentage points. These effects are pervasive, last for at least six years and significantly reduce high-school completion rates. Second, we document that other important dimensions of children's lives are affected. Following the layoff, children are more likely to work informally, commit crime, and experience early pregnancy. In turn, parents reduce educational investments by moving children from private to lower-quality public schools. Using a clean regression discontinuity design, we show that access to unemployment benefits effectively mitigates some of the intergenerational impacts of job loss, notably on teenage school dropouts and crime, and on parental investments in school quality. Our findings indicate that the income losses following parental displacement are an important mechanism of the effects on children, highlighting the importance of policies that provide income support for displaced workers. |
| Keywords: | parental job loss, children's outcomes, unemployment insurance, Brazil |
| JEL: | K42 J63 J65 |
| Date: | 2022–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp15591&r= |
| By: | Michela Tincani (University College London); Fabian Kosse (LMU Munich); Enrico Miglino (University College London) |
| Abstract: | Exploiting the randomized expansion of preferential college admissions in Chile, we show they increased admission and enrollment of disadvantaged students by 32%. But the intended beneficiaries were nearly three times as many, and of higher average ability, than those induced to be admitted. The evidence points to students making pre-college choices that caused this divergence. Using linked survey-administrative data, we present evidence consistent with students being averse to preferential enrollment, misperceiving their abilities, and having social preferences towards their friends (although social preferences did not mediate the admission impacts). Simulations from an estimated structural model suggest that aversion to the preferential channel more than halved the enrollment impacts, by inducing some to forgo preferential admission eligibility, and that students' misperceptions worsened the ability-composition of college entrants, by distorting pre-college investments into admission qualifications. The results demonstrate the importance of understanding high school students' preferences and beliefs when designing preferential admissions. |
| Keywords: | Chile, student choice, social preferences, subjective beliefs |
| JEL: | I23 I24 D91 J24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hka:wpaper:2022-034&r= |
| By: | Gerard,François,Naritomi,Joana,Silva,Joana C. G. |
| Abstract: | Cash transfer programs have expanded widely in developing countries and have been credited for sizable reductions in poverty. However, their potential disincentive effects on beneficiaries' labor supply have spurred a heated policy debate. This paper studies the impact of a large-scale program Bolsa Familia in Brazil on local labor markets in a context where such concerns could be particularly strong: eligibility is means-tested and the paper focuses on the formal labor market, where earnings are more easily verifiable. Yet, the analysis finds that an expansion of Bolsa Familia increased local formal employment, using variation in the size of the reform across municipalities. The evidence is consistent with multiplier effects of cash transfers in the local economy, which dominate potential negative effects on formal labor supply among beneficiaries. |
| Keywords: | Labor Markets,Rural Labor Markets,Inequality,Economic Assistance,Disability,Services&Transfers to Poor,Access of Poor to Social Services,Employment and Unemployment |
| Date: | 2021–09–22 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:9778&r= |
| By: | Tincani, Michela M. (University College London); Kosse, Fabian (University of Würzburg); Miglino, Enrico (University College London) |
| Abstract: | Exploiting the randomized expansion of preferential college admissions in Chile, we show they increased admission and enrollment of disadvantaged students by 32%. But the intended beneficiaries were nearly three times as many, and of higher average ability, than those induced to be admitted. The evidence points to students making pre-college choices that caused this divergence. Using linked survey-administrative data, we present evidence consistent with students being averse to preferential enrollment, misperceiving their abilities, and having social preferences towards their friends (although social preferences did not mediate the admission impacts). Simulations from an estimated structural model suggest that aversion to the preferential channel more than halved the enrollment impacts, by inducing some to forgo preferential admission eligibility, and that students' misperceptions worsened the ability-composition of college entrants, by distorting pre-college investments into admission qualifications. The results demonstrate the importance of understanding high school students' preferences and beliefs when designing preferential admissions. |
| Keywords: | preferential college admission, experimental policy evaluation, subjective beliefs |
| JEL: | I2 D8 |
| Date: | 2022–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp15633&r= |
| By: | Cueva,Ronald; Del Carpio,Ximena Vanessa; Winkler,Hernan Jorge |
| Abstract: | This paper provides new evidence on the impacts of the COVID-19 economic crisis on a labor market with a high prevalence of informality. The analysis uses a rich longitudinal household survey for Peru that contains a host of individual and job outcomes before and during the first months of the lockdown in 2020. The findings show that workers who had jobs in non-essential and informal sectors were significantly more likely to become unemployed. In contrast to developed countries, having a job amenable to working from home is not correlated with job loss when controlling for informal status. This is consistent with the high level of labor market segmentation observed in Peru, where high-skilled occupations are disproportionately concentrated in the formal sector, which was also better targeted by policies aimed at supporting firms and job protection during the crisis. In addition, the findings show that women were more likely to lose their jobs because female-dominated sectors are more intensive in face-to-face interactions and thereby more affected by social distancing measures. Increased childcare responsibilities also help explain the worse impacts on women in rural areas. Finally, workers who depended on public transportation before the crisis were more likely to lose their jobs during the early months of the pandemic. |
| Keywords: | Labor Markets,Transport Services,Rural Labor Markets,Urban Transport,Transport in Urban Areas |
| Date: | 2021–05–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:9675&r= |
| By: | Verónica Amarante; Marisa Bucheli; Cecilia Lara |
| Abstract: | Este artículo analiza el grado de consenso entre los economistas en relación con diversas temáticas económicas para el caso uruguayo. A través de una encuesta en línea, y en base a una escala tipo Likert de cinco niveles, se recoge el nivel de apoyo a 39 proposiciones sobre temas económicos. Se concluye que la tendencia al consenso fuerte y sustancial es menor a la encontrada en otros países. Los mayores niveles de acuerdo se detectan en preguntas relativas a discriminación y, en menor medida, a temas ambientales. También se detecta acuerdo en la necesidad de mayor equidad de ingresos y en la importancia del rol del Estado para alcanzarla, pero no hay consenso sobre las herramientas redistributivas. En base a un análisis de correspondencia múltiple y utilizando la metodología de clusters, se distinguen dos grupos diferenciados en función de sus opiniones sobre temas económicos. La pertenencia a uno u otro grupo está fuertemente asociada al posicionamiento ideológico del economista. |
| Keywords: | economistas, consenso, opiniones |
| JEL: | A11 A14 |
| Date: | 2022–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ude:wpaper:0322&r= |
| By: | Ferreyra,Maria Marta; Galindo,Camila; Urzúa,Sergio |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates the labor market effects of enrolling in a short-cycle program in Colombia. Following evidence for the U.S., increasing access to short-cycle degrees might attract some students who would not have enrolled in higher education otherwise (i.e., the expansion or democratization margin), while also inducing other students to divert from bachelor's- and into short-cycle- degrees (i.e., the diversion margin). To identify responses along these margins, this paper uses an Instrumental Variables strategy and exploits local variation in the supply of short-cycle programs for the universe of high school graduates in 2005. Having at least one higher education institution specialized in short-cycle degrees within a 10 km radius of the student’s high school municipality increases enrollment in short-cycle programs by 3 percentage points, or 30 percent of the sample average. Results indicate that this enrollment increase is largely driven by students who would divert from bachelor's to short-cycle degrees due to changes in the local supply of short-cycle program. For these students, SCPs improve participation in the formal labor market among females, although they lead to lower monthly wages among males. |
| Keywords: | Educational Sciences,Tertiary Education,Labor Markets,Rural Labor Markets,Employment and Unemployment,Financial Sector Policy |
| Date: | 2021–06–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:9717&r= |
| By: | Leites, Martin (Universidad de la República, Uruguay); Paleo, Camila (IECON, Universidad de la República); Ramos, Xavier (Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona); Salas, Gonzalo (IECON, Universidad de la República) |
| Abstract: | Do individuals choose their reference groups, i.e. their Joneses, or are they culturally transmitted across generations? We provide evidence that feeds the theoretical debate about the endogeneity or exogeneity of reference groups. Our findings for Uruguay suggest that reference groups are largely transmitted across generations. We also find individuals to have multiple reference groups and these to be context-specific. Our results are robust to several checks and to endogeneity issues. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational transmission, reference group, income comparisons |
| JEL: | D31 D62 D63 Z13 |
| Date: | 2022–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp15584&r= |