Our research examines the relationship between economic regulatory quality and GDP per capita. We use panel data from 18 South American and Caribbean countries, between 2000 and 2015 using GMM panel estimation. The results reveal a non-linear U-shaped relationship between economic regulatory...

Tax policy is among the most common and relevant instruments in the toolkit of policy-makers when thinking about promoting growth, yet there is not compelling evidence regarding its effect in Latin American countries. Using a variety of approaches, we estimate the effects on growth of the most...

Since the end of World War II, Argentina has been through an uninterrupted series of financial/fiscal and monetary crises that have gradually eroded the credibilityof the economic institutions of the country. In the period from 1970 to 1990 alone, the Argentine economy experienced seven currency...

This paper aims to analyze, from a legal perspective, the public policies of Science, Technology and Innovation offered by the Brazilian government, more specifically, the Innovation Act (Lei de Inovação), in order to verify the effectiveness and impact of this measure for development, in the...

Recent research links the inequality across countries and regions to colonial institutions. This paper argues that trade shocks could alter the development path of a country or subnational units, in spite of its colonial institutions. This hypothesis is analyzed using state-level data for...

In this paper, we contribute to the discussion of what determines country risk by arguing that an important explanatory factor is the impact that commodities have on the capacity to pay. We use a newly created data base with state-level fiscal and risk premium data for Brazil states between 1891...

This paper studies the historical origins of the federalist institutions in Mexico and Brazil. Using a bargaining game model, I argue that the type of commodities each country produced by the end of the nineteenth Century determined the negotiation power of local governments. This led to the...

This paper examines how the adoption of the Australian ballot (AB), and ipso facto, the transition from the nominal to effective secret vote, shaped the nature of party politics in Brazil. Engaging the literature on political clientelism, the impact of the AB on three outcomes is studied: 1) the...

The article presents an analysis of the relations between national state and human rights in Brazil between the years of 1968 and 1996. The purpose is to reconstruct the historical process of the incorporation of this theme as a state policy and to put into evidence the conditionings of the...

The essay intends to analyze the competition policy in Brazil after twelve years of the Law n. 8.884/1994, which has effectively inaugurated it. Thus, it initiates with a historical approach, exposing the principal premises that guide this public policy exercise. Utilizing data from the...