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on Central and South America |
|
Issue of 2022‒10‒17
three papers chosen by |
| By: | Andre Groeger; Gianmarco León-Ciliotta; Steven Stillman |
| Abstract: | Venezuela is currently experiencing the biggest crisis in its recent history. This has led more than 5.6 million Venezuelans to emigrate, one million of those to Peru, which amounted to an increase of over 2 percent in the Peruvian population. Venezuelan immigrants in Peru are relatively similar in cultural terms, but, on average, more skilled than Peruvians. In this paper, we first examine Venezuelans’ perceptions about being discriminated against in Peru. Using an instrumental variable strategy, we document a causal relationship between the level of employment in the informal sector – where most immigrants are employed – and reports of discrimination. We then study the impact of Venezuelan migration on local’s labor market outcomes, reported crime rates and attitudes using a variety of data sources. We find that inflows of Venezuelans to particular locations led to increased employment and income among locals, decreased reported crime, and improved reported community quality. We conduct a heterogeneity analysis to identify the mechanisms behind these labor market effects and discuss the implications for Peruvian immigration policy. |
| Keywords: | immigration, forced migration, discrimination, labor markets, Peru, Venezuela |
| JEL: | F22 J15 O15 R23 |
| Date: | 2022–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1350&r= |
| By: | Paolo Pinotti (Bocconi University); Diogo G. C. Britto (Bocconi University); Alexandre Fonseca (Federal Revenue of Brazil); Breno Sampaio (Universidade Federal de Pernambuco); Lucas Warwar (Universidade Federal de Pernambuco) |
| Abstract: | We provide the first estimates of intergenerational income mobility for a developing country, namely Brazil. We measure formal income from tax and employment registries, and we train machine learning models on census and survey data to predict informal income. The data reveal a much higher degree of persistence than previous estimates available for developed economies: a 10 percentile increase in parental income rank is associated with a 5.5 percentile increase in child income rank, and persistence is even higher in the top 5%. Children born to parents in the first income quintile face a 46% chance of remaining at the bottom when adults. We validate these estimates using two novel mobility measures that rank children and parents without the need to impute informal income. We document substantial heterogeneity in mobility across individual characteristics - notably gender and race - and across Brazilian regions. Leveraging children who migrate at different ages, we estimate that causal place effects explain 57% of the large spatial variation in mobility. Finally, assortative mating plays a strong role in household income persistence, and parental income is also strongly associated with several key long-term outcomes such as education, teenage pregnancy, occupation, mortality, and victimization. |
| Keywords: | Intergenerational Mobility, Inequality, Brazil, Migration, Place Effects |
| JEL: | J62 D31 I31 R23 |
| Date: | 2022–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:2322&r= |
| By: | Jennifer Lopez (Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE)); Jere Behrman (University of Pennsylvania); Santiago Cueto (Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE) and Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru); Marta Favara (University of Oxford); Alan Sánchez (Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE)) |
| Abstract: | We estimate the associations between a set of foundational cognitive skills (inhibitory control, working memory, long-term memory, and implicit learning) measured at age 12 and educational outcomes measured at ages 15 and 19-20 in Ethiopia and Peru (the Young Lives study). The estimates adjust for a rich set of lagged controls and include measurements of children’s general abilities. For a subset of the outcomes, we exploit within-household variation. Working memory and long-term memory are consistently and positively associated with subsequent domain-specific cognitive achievement tests in both countries, university enrolment in Peru (working memory) and lower secondary-school completion in Ethiopia (long-term memory). Inhibitory control predicts subsequent math-test scores in both countries, and grade attainment in Ethiopia. These results provide additional evidence to justify the importance of promoting investments in cognitive skills throughout childhood and adolescence, and these results potentially elucidate how investments in children impact their educational achievements. |
| Keywords: | human capital, cognitive skills; education; executive function; Ethiopia; Peru |
| JEL: | I25 I24 I23 |
| Date: | 2022–09–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pen:papers:22-024&r= |