In this paper, we examine the determinants of Brazilian city growth between 1970 and 2000. We consider a model of a city, which combines aspects of standard urban economics and the new economic geography literatures. For the empirical analysis, we constructed a dataset of 123 Brazilian...

The share of urban population in Brazil has increased from 58 to 80 percent between 1970 and 2000 and all net population growth over the next thirty years is predicted to be in cities. This paper explores population growth and its implications for economic dynamics and income generation among...

This paper investigates informal employment in Brazil's highly regulated labor market, focusing on the intensive margin of informality within formal firms. Using a comprehensive dataset of labor audits conducted from 1997 to 2012, we find that formal firms caught with informal workers face...

This paper describes the main characteristics of reverse mortgage and it also assesses the main aspects related to its implementation in Brazil. A reverse mortgage is an equity release product that allows old people to convert their housing asset into an income flow, without the requirement of...

There was substantial spatial variation in labor market outcomes in Brazil over the 1990's. In 2000, about one fifth of workers lived in apparently economically stagnant municipios where real wages declined but employment increased faster than the national population growth rate. More than one...

We describe econometric techniques to treat spatial autocorrelation in multiequation cross-section models. The cross-section approaches discussed here are heavily based on the spatial GMM procedure, proposed by Conley (1999). An extension for fullinformation instrumental variable models is...

This paper investigates if the anti-scientific rhetoric of modern populists can induce followers to engage in risky behavior. We gather electoral information, in-person card transactions, and geo-localized mobile phone data for approximately 60 million devices in Brazil. After the president...

This paper studies how in utero exposure to a large-scale climate adaptation program affects birth outcomes. The program built around one million cisterns in Brazil's poorest and driest region to promote small-scale decentralized rainfall harvesting. Access to cisterns during early pregnancy...

Using admission lotteries and registry data linking labour market outcomes, we study the effect of a vocational training programme focused on disadvantaged individuals in Brazil. The intensive programme is an 18-month classroom training coupled with a 6-month on-the-job training provided by...

This paper quantifies the causal effects of various types of investments in the road and railroad networks on economic growth in Chinese cities and regions. We separate out the influences of changes in access to markets that have come through better inter-regional and international transport...