This paper examines the reasons behind the low rates of participation in old age pension programs in developing countries. Using a large set of harmonized household surveys from Latin America we assess how much of the low participation can be explained by involuntary rationing out of jobs with...

This paper examines a much overlooked link between credit markets and formalization: since access to bank credit typically requires compliance with tax and employment legislation, firms are more likely to incur such formalization costs once bank credit is more widely available at lower cost. The...

Financial turmoil is becoming a fact of life in Latin America. The 1990s have been characterized by enormous volatility in the magnitude and cost of capital flows. The correlation of capital swings across disparate countries suggests that the quality of emerging market policies in addition to...

(Disponible en idioma inglés únicamente) En este trabajo se pasa revista a las normas que rigen la contratación y el despido de trabajadores, así como el trabajo en tiempo extra, los aportes al régimen de seguridad social, el salario mínimo y la negociación de contratos colectivos en la...

Economists have examined the impact of labor market regulations on the level of employment. But there are many reasons to suspect that the impact of regulations differs across types of workers. In this paper the authors take advantage of the unusually large variance in labor policy in Chile to...

Using data on more than 56,000 enterprises in 90 countries, this paper finds that objective conditions in the business environment vary substantially across firms of different sizes and that there are important non-linearities in their impact on employment growth. The paper focuses on four...

This paper reviews the regulations governing hiring, firing, overtime work, social security contributions, minimum wages, and collective bargaining in the region, examining their impact on labor market outcomes.

This paper analyzes the recent performance of Latin American labor markets. We find that unemployment rates are on the rise in most countries and sub-regions of Latin America. The rise in unemployment over the 1990s is not driven by a higher proportion of women, adults or urban workers in the...

(Disponible en idioma inglés únicamente) El aumento de la productividad de la mano de obra se entiende como un factor crítico del aumento del crecimiento económico y la reducción de los niveles de pobreza en América Latina. Se sigue señalando a los bajos niveles de preparación como el...