This paper explores, both formally and empirically, the political accountability mechanisms that lie behind the varying levels of public corruption and of effective governance taking place across nations. The first section develops a principal-agent model in which good governance is a function...

This paper shows that the factors affecting labor supply have been key determinants of the changes in employment, unemployment, and income differentials in Latin America in the 1990s. The two main forces driving labor supply in the region have been demographics and education.

Abundant empirical evidence links well-functioning institutions and good governance to better economic and social outcomes. It is thus an important challenge to determine which conjunction of factors produces better institutions. Along this line, the objective of this paper is twofold. First, it...

This paper takes advantage of several reforms that provide time and cross sectional variation to identify the effects of unemployment insurance and severance payments on the duration of unemployment and on the separation probability in Argentina. Administrative data permits analysis of the...

The aim of this paper is to provide empirical evidence on the link between foreign aid and income inequality for the period 1973-2002. Since simple cross-country regressions cannot be taken as true time series findings, we also focus on dynamic panel data techniques, which allow accounting for...

In this working paper the authors present evidence on the reliability of propensity score matching to estimate the bias associated with the effect of treatment on the treated, exploiting the availability of experimental data from a Mexican antipoverty program (PROGRESA: Programa de Educación,...

Este documento fue presentado en la Conferencia "MERCOSUR: En busca de una nueva agenda", realizada en la Fundación Getulio Vargas en Rio de Janeiro, en junio de 2003. Considerando la dinámica de las políticas emergentes, que apuntan a un renovado interés en profundizar la iniciativa...

Varios países y regiones latinoamericanos van a comenzar a negociar con la Unión Europea (UE) acuerdos comerciales para crear zonas de libre comercio. Para la UE el objetivo de estos acuerdos va más allá de la simple supresión de barreras al comercio exterior de productos. La UE negocia...

Da a conocer el primer documento de trabajo sobre la evaluación de la necesidad de un Aumento General de Capital del Capital Ordinario y una Reposición de Recursos del Fondo para Operaciones Especiales.

This paper estimates the impact of a large temporary poverty relief program, Uruguay's PANES on birth outcomes. Using program administrative data and longitudinal vital statistics, a significant and precisely estimated reduction in the fraction of low-weight newborns (less than 2,500 g. ) on the...