Search

Using unique features of a tariff schedule for natural gas in Buenos Aires, we find that a price increase causes a prompt and significant decline in residential consumption. The results also indicate that consumers respond more to past bills-actual cost paid-than to expected prices. Policymakers and regulators need to move beyond the assumption of perfect awareness of complex price schedules by consumers.

How much do schools differ in their effectiveness? Recent studies that seek to answer this question account for student sorting using random assignment generated by central allocation mechanisms or oversubscribed schools. However, the resulting estimates, while causal, may also reflect peer effects due to differences in peer quality of non-randomized students. We exploit universal random assignment of students to high schools in certain areas of South Korea to provide estimates of school effects that may better reflect the effects of school practices. We find significant effects of schools on scores in high-stakes college entrance exams: a 1 standard deviation increase in school quality leads to 0.06-0.08 standard deviations higher average academic achievement in Korean and English languages. Analogous estimates from areas of South Korea that do not use random assignment, and therefore include the effects of student sorting and peer effects, are substantially higher.

The increased occurrence of extreme weather conditions leading to drought is a key development challenge. This paper studies how these extreme events interact with the political process at the local level using rich administrative data for drought declarations and mayoral elections in Brazil. While accounting for current and historical rainfall patterns, the paper finds that that: i) municipalities led by a mayor affiliated with the President¿s party are more likely to receive formal drought declarations prior to the municipal election; and ii) receiving a drought declaration reinforces the electoral advantage of incumbent mayors running for reelection. These results are robust to the inclusion of a rich set of controls for municipal attributes.

This paper examines whether an expansion in the supply of public preschool crowds out private enrollment, using rich data for municipalities in Brazil from 2000-2006, where federal transfers to local governments change discontinuously with given population thresholds. Results from a regression-discontinuity design reveal that larger federal transfers lead to a significant expansion of local public preschool services, but show no effects on the quantity or quality of private provision. These findings are consistent with a theory in which households differ in willingness to pay for preschool services, and private suppliers optimally adjust prices in response to an expansion of lower-quality, free-of-charge public supply.

Evidence on the impacts of a large-scale expansion in public preprimary education is limited and mostly circumscribed to high and middle-income countries. This paper estimates the effects of such an expansion on progression in primary school in rural communities of Guatemala. Combining administrative and population census data in a difference-in-difference framework, the paper examines a large-scale construction program that increased the number of preprimaries from around 5,300 to 11,500 between 1998 and 2005. The results indicate that the program increased by 2. 1 percentage points the fraction of students that progress adequately and attend sixth grade by age 12. These positive effects are heavily concentrated among girls.

This IDB book includes presentations from the international policy dialogue seminar entitled "New Options for Higher Education in Latin America: Lessons from the Community College Experience." The seminar was sponsored by the Inter-American Development Bank and the Harvard University Graduate School of Education, and held from September 4-8, 2000. The event was attended by participants from 16 Latin American countries and the United States, and included small group discussions of the community college model as well as several short-term post secondary career initiatives being implemented in Latin America. This book explores how these institutions can help address the very challenges faced by post-secondary education in the region: an expanding and heterogeneous clientele, a lack of alternative social mobility options for people unable to attend traditional universities, and the need for more relevant curriculum that emphasized knowledge and skills better attuned to the needs of the job market., Los institutos técnicos superiores son instituciones educativas que ofrecen capacitación postsecundaria por medio de programas más cortos que los de las universidades. Este libro analiza las enseñanzas que los países de América Latina pueden obtener de la experiencia de los institutos técnicos superiores de los Estados Unidos. Aunque la experiencia de los institutos técnicos superiores norteamericanos haya generado ideas de las que América Latina puede beneficiarse, para los autores la respuesta adecuada no es la imitación sistemática, sino una adaptación selectiva. El libro ofrece un panorama de la experiencia de los institutos técnicos superiores en Norteamérica, describe aspectos pertinentes de la educación superior en América Latina y presenta recomendaciones generales para adaptar diversas características del modelo de los institutos técnicos superiores a los países de la región. En él se incluyen algunos de los trabajos presentados en el seminario de debate sobre política internacional "Nuevas opciones para la educación superior en América Latina: lecciones de la experiencia de los community colleges", organizado por el Banco Interamericano de Desarrollo y la Escuela de Posgrado en Educación de la Universidad de Harvard, que se realizó del 4 al 8 de septiembre de 2000 en Harvard.

This paper exploits unique features of a recently introduced tariff schedule for natural gas in Buenos Aires to estimate the short-run impact of price shocks on residential energy utilization. The schedule induces a non-linear and non-monotonic relationship between households' accumulated consumption and unit prices, thus generating an exogenous source of variation in perceived prices, which is exploited in a regression-discontinuity design. The estimates reveal that a price increase in the utility bill received by consumers causes a substantial and prompt decline in gas consumption. Hence they suggest that policy interventions via the price mechanism, such as price caps and subsidies, are powerful instruments to influence residential energy utilization patterns, even within a short time span.

This paper develops a two-country, general equilibrium model of oligopoly in which the degree of horizontal product differentiation is endogenously determined by rms strategic investments in product innovation. Consumers seek variety and product innovation is more skill intensive than production. Stronger import competition increases innovation incentives, and thereby the relative demand for skill. An intraindustry trade expansion following trade liberalization can therefore increase wage inequality between skilled and unskilled workers. In addition, since product differentiation is resource consuming, freer trade entails a potential trade-off between production and variety. The import competition effect highlighted by the model, which plays a key role in determining the general equilibrium, is consistent with panel data on Chilean manufacturing plants.

Many developing countries have adopted the market approach for expanding the supply of child care, but little is known about the economic behavior of independent providers. This paper draws on uniquely rich administrative data on child care centers and their inputs from São Paulo to examine the role of local household income in shaping the entry and quality choices of private suppliers. It documents three main facts: (1) entry rates are considerably higher in high-income districts; (2) the quality of provision as measured by teachers¿ schooling, group size and equipment is highly heterogeneous across space and increases systematically with local household income; and (3) a considerable share of centers operates below recommended (but not regulated) quality standards, especially in low-income districts. These findings accord with a model in which heterogeneous providers optimally adjust the quality of care to the willingness to pay for quality of local consumers. Market-driven heterogeneity in the quality of provision across space is a key consideration for understanding the effect of regulations on the supply of child care.

This IDB book includes presentations from the international policy dialogue seminar entitled "New Options for Higher Education in Latin America: Lessons from the Community College Experience." The seminar was sponsored by the Inter-American Development Bank and the Harvard University Graduate School of Education, and held from September 4-8, 2000. The event was attended by participants from 16 Latin American countries and the United States, and included small group discussions of the community college model as well as several short-term post secondary career initiatives being implemented in Latin America. This book explores how these institutions can help address the very challenges faced by post-secondary education in the region: an expanding and heterogeneous clientele, a lack of alternative social mobility options for people unable to attend traditional universities, and the need for more relevant curriculum that emphasized knowledge and skills better attuned to the needs of the job market.

In Latin America, clientelism pervades civil services; bureaucrats entrusted with critical areas of national life are often hired more for their political value than professional competence. This issue of IDEA was prepared by Steven Ambrus and Rita Funaro, and is based largely on research conducted at the IDB on governance issues. The articles presented in this newsletter are based on the research of Paulo Bastos, Paolo Buonanno, María Franco Chuaire, Daniel Gingerich, Enrique Kawamura, Sebastián Miller, Virginia Oliveros, Sebastián Saiegh, Carlos Scartascini, Christian Schuster, Jorge Streb, and Juan Fernando Vargas., En América Latina, el clientelismo está muy extendido en la administración pública;los burócratas encargados de los aspectos críticos de la vida nacional a menudo son contratados más por su valor político que por su competencia profesional. El presente número de IDEA fue preparado por Steven Ambrus y Rita Funaro, y se basa principalmente en investigaciones sobre aspectos de la gestión gubernamental realizadas en el BID. Los artículos incluidos en este boletín se basan en la labor investigativa de Paulo Bastos, Paolo Buonanno, María Franco Chuaire, Daniel Gingerich, Enrique Kawamura, Sebastián Miller, Virginia Oliveros, Sebastián Saiegh, Carlos Scartascini, Christian Schuster, Jorge Streb y Juan Fernando Vargas.

In Latin America, clientelism pervades civil services; bureaucrats entrusted with critical areas of national life are often hired more for their political value than professional competence. This issue of IDEA was prepared by Steven Ambrus and Rita Funaro, and is based largely on research conducted at the IDB on governance issues. The articles presented in this newsletter are based on the research of Paulo Bastos, Paolo Buonanno, María Franco Chuaire, Daniel Gingerich, Enrique Kawamura, Sebastián Miller, Virginia Oliveros, Sebastián Saiegh, Carlos Scartascini, Christian Schuster, Jorge Streb, and Juan Fernando Vargas.

"July 1985.", Includes bibliographical references, Introduction / Antonio Botelho and Peter H. Smith -- High Technology or Self Reliance? : Brazil Enters the Computer Age / Simon Schwartzman -- Varieties of Nationalism : The Politics of the Brazilian Computer Industry / Peter Evans -- The Brazilian Computer Industry : Performance and Perspectives / Paulo Bastos Tigre