In recent years, reducing poverty has been a core objective of social policy in Latin America. In2008, the incidence of poverty reached almost a third of the population, of which 13 percent areclassified as extremely poor. Most Latin American countries have invested vast resources inpoverty...

We consider a model that provides insight into the well-known Folk theorem in economics that when the discount factor beta is sufficiently close to 1, expropriation will never occur. Although this Folk theorem is true in our model, our perspective is different. The discount factor beta often is...

The purpose of this thesis is a characterization of the monetary regime followed by the Brazilian authorities during the 80's and beginning of the 90's, and its consequences for the credibility of anti-inflationary policies, the solvency condition of the government, and the power of restrictive...

This dissertation explores two subjects. The first one is the relationship between low liquidity in secondary markets for capital and the insufficient supply of long term funding for productive investment. The first chapter shows how shallow or non-existent secondary markets for capital can...

The impact of an ageing population on the economy is one of the key issues in most developed countries. It is a generally accepted notion that an ageing population could cause negative effects, including a decrease of per-capita output and economic welfare, on the economy mainly due to the...

The Introductory chapter briefly describes the unintended emergence of the seconday market for developing country loans after protracted and unsuccessful negotiations between lending bankers and the indebted countries. The innovative Brady plan presented the banks involved in this market with...

This dissertation consists of two essays. The first essay is a study of strategic firm competition in a differentiated product environment. We develop a tractable spatial model of oligopolistic competition in which firms endogenously determine both franchise/product locations and prices....

In three chapters I study the formation of social networks, and the impact the structures that arise may have in various economic settings. First, I develop a model of social network formation with heterogeneous agents and incomplete information. The model predicts an equilibrium in which agents...