"Sergio G. Lazzarini is the Chafi Haddad Professor of Management at Insper in Brazil. He is the Director of Insper Metricis, a center dedicated to the study of impact management and measurement. Sergio has held visiting positions at Harvard University (2010, 2012), University of St Gallen...

Received theories suggest a possible cost-quality tradeoff when private outsourcing arrangements are used in public services. Using data from Brazilian prisons, our study provides evidence that contradicts this prediction: the prisons not only run at a lower cost, but also show similar or...

The public debate is rife with polarized views of how to deliver essential services such as education, health, and security. While some tout privatization as a way to supplant bad governments, others warn that private firms maximize profits at the expense of socially oriented service attributes....