-
作者:Winkelried, Diego
摘要:This paper studies the dynamic properties of relative commodity prices, especially the Prebisch-Singer hypothesis on their secular decline, using a new family of unit root tests based on the Fourier approximation to the data's underlying trend. The approximation controls for low-frequency variations such as structural breaks or the long swings induced by hypothesized super cycles in the data. Regarding the extant literature, we find considerably more evidence against nonstationarity in relativ...
-
作者:Shi, Xiangyu; Xi, Tianyang
作者单位:Yale University; Peking University
摘要:When political agents are subject to centralized performance evaluation, their efforts and performances tend to be correlated with one another in the neighborhood. Using quarterly data from prefecture-level cities in China, this paper finds evidence of positive neighborhood effects on coal mine deaths: the number of accidental deaths in a city is positively associated with those in its political neighbors. The neighborhood effects are confined by provincial borders, but do not diminish as the ...
-
作者:Francis-Tan, Andrew; Tannuri-Pianto, Maria
作者单位:National University of Singapore; Universidade de Brasilia; National University of Singapore
摘要:The recent adoption of race-targeted policies makes Brazil an insightful place to study affirmative action. In this paper, we estimate the effects of racial quotas at the University of Brasilia, which reserved 20% of admissions slots for persons who self-identified as black. To do so, we link the admissions outcomes of high-performing applicants in 2004-2005 to their education and labor market outcomes in 2012. We adopt methods that make use of sharp discontinuities in the admissions process. ...
-
作者:Piza, Caio
作者单位:The World Bank
摘要:A recent survey of programs aimed at helping small firms to formalize indicates that most programs fail at achieving this goal. One study reported that the Brazilian tax simplification program, SIMPLES, had a large effect on firms' formalization rates. Using the same data set, another study concluded that the program had a limited effect on formalization rates. The aim of this paper is twofold: (a) to provide a thorough discussion of methodological issues that escaped the two previous evaluati...
-
作者:Banerjee, Abhijit; Barnhardt, Sharon; Duflo, Esther
作者单位:Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT); Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
摘要:Iron deficiency anemia is frequent among the poor worldwide. While it can be prevented with the appropriate supplement or food fortification, these programs struggle to reach the poorest, out-of-school children, men and the elderly. This paper reports on the impact of a potential strategy to address iron deficiency anemia in rural areas: salt fortified with iron and iodine (DFS). We conduct a large-scale experiment in 400 villages in Bihar to test the impacts of both selling DFS and giving it ...
-
作者:Steinert, Janina Isabel; Cluver, Lucie Dale; Meinck, Franziska; Doubt, Jenny; Vollmer, Sebastian
作者单位:University of Oxford; University of Cape Town; North West University - South Africa; University of Gottingen; University of Gottingen; Harvard University; Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health
摘要:Using data from a randomized field experiment with 552 households, nested within 40 villages and townships in South Africa, we examine the impact of a brief financial literacy training that was integrated into a broader psychosocial parenting intervention. Based on self-reported measures, we document significant improvements in financial behaviors, including higher saving and lower borrowing rates. We also see wider implications for household economic welfare, demonstrated by reduced self-repo...
-
作者:Hiller, Victor
作者单位:Universite Paris-Pantheon-Assas
摘要:We propose a dynamic general equilibrium model that accounts for the historical pattern of the rise and fall of factory discipline in the course of economic development. Firms have two alternative means to increase work effort: discipline and control vs. monetary incentives. A key ingredient of our model lies in the fact that workers suffer from present-bias. We show that this lack of self-control makes discipline relatively cheap when workers' outside option is low even in the absence of mora...
-
作者:Bahar, Dany; Santos, Miguel A.
作者单位:Brookings Institution; Institute of Advanced Studies in Administration (IESA)
摘要:Economists have long discussed the negative effect of Dutch disease episodes on the non-resource tradable sector as a whole, but little has been said on its impact on the composition of the non-resource export sector. This paper fills this gap by exploring to what extent concentration of a country's non-resource export basket is determined by their exports of natural resources. We present a theoretical framework that shows how upward pressure in wages caused by a resource windfall results in h...
-
作者:Morales, Juan S.
作者单位:Collegio Carlo Alberto
摘要:More than ten percent of the population of Colombia has been forced to migrate due to civil war. This study employs an enclave IV strategy, which exploits social distance between origin and destination locations, as well as conflict-induced migration, to estimate the impact that the arrival of displaced individuals has on the wages of local residents. I compare the effects on four different subgroups of the population, partitioned by skill (low skilled versus high-skilled) and by gender. The a...
-
作者:Grogan, Louise
作者单位:University of Guelph
摘要:This paper examines how obtaining a household electric connection affects the time allocation of rural, indigenous Guatemalans during 2000-2011. Following the end of a thirty-six year civil war, a Rural Electrification Plan substantially expanded electricity access, and subsidized use. This public-private partnership pays companies a fixed fee for connecting households. Causal impacts on time use of individuals are identified using initial geospatial inequalities in public goods provisions wit...