We use data from polling stations and public primary schools to estimate the electoral effects of making school quality information available to voters. We exploit the introduction of a school-level accountability system in Brazil that provides, for the first time, information about school quality and exploit variation in schools affected by the policy. We find that incumbent vote shares are 2.14 percentage points higher for schools in the top 20% of our sample’s distribution of school quality and 1.54 percentage points lower for schools in the bottom 20% of the distribution. These effects are mostly driven by the unpredicted component of school quality and are larger for more educated voters.

Using a choice experiment in the lab, we assess the relative importance of different attitudes to income inequality. We elicit subjects’ preferences regarding pairs of payoff distributions within small groups, in a firm-like setting. We find that distributions that satisfy the Pareto-dominance criterion attract unanimous suffrage: all subjects prefer larger inequality provided it makes everyone weakly better off. This is true no matter whether payoffs are based on merit or luck. Unanimity only breaks once subjects’ positions within the income distribution are fixed and known ex-ante. Even then, 75% of subjects prefer Pareto-dominant distributions, but 25% of subjects engage in money burning at the top in order to reduce inequality, even when it does not make anyone better off. A majority of subjects embrace a more equal distribution if their own income or overall efficiency is not at stake. When their own income is at stake and the sum of payoffs remains unaffected, 20% of subjects are willing to pay for a lower degree of inequality.

Esse trabalho estima a transmissão da variação da taxa de câmbio nominal para o índice de preços oficial brasileiro, seus subgrupos e subitens. Os resultados apontam que flutuações do pass-through do câmbio para a inflação podem ser explicados pelo hiato do produto e pelo desvio das expectativas de inflação em relação à meta, entretanto, o repasse se mostrou maior em períodos de depreciação cambial se comparados a períodos de apreciação. Adicionalmente, encontramos não-linearidade do pass-through, uma vez que esse se amplifica no caso de variações acima de 10%.

Funds close and open over time. The existing evidence is that those that close are those with lower cumulative returns in the period prior to closing. This dissertation shows that this closing dynamic also appears in the Brazilian stock funds market. In a sample of 1192 equity funds, from 2002 to 2016, 448 funds closed. Of these, 39 funds lead to the opening of another under the same management. I show that open-ended closing is typically accompanied by increased return volatility, which I interpret as an attempt to change the investment strategy previously followed. However, this change does not change the manager’s abnormal return, as estimated by Carhart’s 4-factor model. Finally, I show that the likelihood of fund closure increases with the number of funds opened by the manager in the month prior to closing. This suggests that managers open new funds before closing others to minimize the chance of losing investors.

Em países que oferecem fraca proteção legal aos minoritários, empresas que regularmente pagam dividendos elevados são percebidas pelo mercado como exemplos de boa prática de governança. Nesse contexto, empresas que precisam estabelecer uma reputação de tratar bem os minoritários deveriam ter mais incentivos para pagar dividendos do que empresas que já estabeleceram tal reputação. Estão as empresas do governo e as estrangeiras entre as que precisam estabelecer uma reputação de tratar bem os acionistas minoritários? Ou será que elas herdam a reputação de suas controladoras? Para responder essas perguntas, comparo as políticas de dividendo e as decisões de endividamento de empresas do governo, empresas estrangeiras e demais empresas privadas com ações listadas na B3, entre 2003 e 2017. Os dados mostram que as empresas estrangeiras e as que têm participação acionária do governo inferior a 50% adotam políticas de dividendos mais agressivas do que demais empresas privadas na B3, sugerindo que elas ainda precisam construir uma reputação de respeito aos minoritários.

This thesis is comprised of three essays. The first two investigate the relationship between households per capita income and sectoral expenditure shares both in times series and in cross-section in the postwar US. The first uses a partial approach to estimate the rise of consumption (income) dispersion and income effects in the US from 1980 to 2010. We show that income effects are heterogeneous across households grouped by income quintiles and then consumption dispersion correlates the two main driving forces of structural change (price and income effects) in accounting for the magnitude of structural change in the shares of consumption expenditure in the US over this period. The second extends a canonical Bewley-Aiyagari model in continuous time embedded with a two-sector environment to depict quantitatively three empirical regularities in the postwar US (relative price of goods falls and expenditure shares of goods falls systematically with per capita income, both in times series and in cross-section) without departing from benchmark Stone- Geary preferences. We assess the importance of changes in income and relative prices for structural change in the shares of consumption expenditure in the postwar US and conclude they are nearly equivalent forces. We reinforce that reconciling these three main empirical regularities in the postwar US calls for a growth theory that accommodates long-run demand and supply drivers of structural change. Finally, the third essay uses a unique panel dataset with individual-level administrative records of credit transactions, program benefits, individual demographics and features of labor contracts to study how consumers respond to a liquidity shock arising from withdrawals releases from inactive accounts of the Guarantee Fund for Time of Service (FGTS) in Brazil in 2017. Using a difference-in-differences identification design, we find consumption rose and total debt declined after the announcement: during up to twelve subsequent months, for each $1 of program benefit, consumers on average increased consumption spending by $ 0.53 - 25 percent of which occurs during the announcement window - and total debt declined by $0.07, specially in payroll debt. Consumption response occurred mostly via credit card spending, but evidence of debt-financed durables was also found. Indebted consumers used short-term liquidity in debt modalities (overdraft debt and credit card debt) in addition to credit card spending to smooth consumption. Constrained consumers, measured as young or old, showed stronger consumption responses.

This study aims to investigate whether there is a relationship between aggregate Brazilian mutual fund positions and past, concurrent, and future stock performance. Using monthly fund portfolio data for 30.416 funds between 2006 and 2018 and market data for 84 stocks, several panel data regressions were ran to test the correlation between stock total returns and both the level and change in mutual fund aggregate long and short positions. In addition, the data was used in testing a long-short investing strategy in which stocks with high fund ownership indicators are purchased and stocks with low fund ownership indicators are sold.

In this paper, we study the case of Brazilian oil and gas auctions to assess the impact of local content requirements in bidding behavior, allowing us to estimate its impact on government revenue. The Brazilian case is particularly appealing, as there were significant changes in these requirements throughout the years. In the sales with increased local content requirements there was a dramatic change in the bidders behavior: the average signing bonus for offshore tracts dropped from an average of R$ 57 million in the first sales to only R$ 10.6 million and the average number of bids per tract plunged from 0.92 to 0.12. We aim to answer how much the increased local content requirements affected participation and revenue in the auctions. We develop and estimate a structural auction model within the mineral rights framework that includes an entry decision and bids in multiple dimensions, including a bonus and a local content percentage. Our results show that local content requirements increase costs in deep water areas in 14%. Government revenue in auctions in these areas could be much larger in a counterfactual with no local content requirements, amounting to an extra R$ 17 billion in signing bonus only for deep-water tracts. For onshore areas, we did not find any significant difference between local and foreign costs.

Este trabalho analisa a eficácia da estratégia do fator Betting Against Beta (BAB), estabelecido por Frazzini e Pedersen (2014), aplicado no mercado de ações brasileiro. Os resultados indicam alfa significativo e persistente para BAB no Brasil mesmo quando controlado para demais fatores de risco conhecidos. O desempenho do fator BAB foi analisado sob a especificação original e permaneceu robusto à variações do parâmetro de suavização e janelas de estimação dos betas ex-ante. Adicionalmente, verificou-se a relevância da inclinação da curva de juros spot do Brasil e condições de liquidez do mercado como previsores do desempenho de BAB. Os resultados indicam elevada significância da inclinação de juros e da liquidez do mercado na performance contemporânea do fator BAB.

The weak identification problem arises naturally in macroeconomic models. Consequently, instrumental variables methods produce puzzling results more often than what is empirically plausible. We propose novel methods to address puzzles usually featured in two of the main equations in macro models, namely the New-Keynesian Phillips Curve (NKPC) and the Euler Equation (EE). For the former, difficulties to estimate a positive slope without incurring a degree of stickiness incompatible with the micro evidence are widely known. We address the matter in the first chapter, proposing a richer framework of a multi-sector economy with price-setting heterogeneity. The procedure generates positive and roughly unchanging slope coefficients across econometric settings, as well as degrees of stickiness in line with the micro data, both regarding the entire economy and the cross section of sectors. Importantly, all of these estimates move consistently with implications by theory when modifying the model assumptions. The second chapter focuses on the estimation of the elasticity of intertemporal substitution (EIS), central parameter of the EE in models of dynamic choice. There, we argue that the use of officially reported consumption data – which is usually filtered, smoothed, interpolated, etc – distorts estimates of the EIS. A generalised model to “unfilter” available consumption data is proposed, suitable for several types of data – macro and micro – at different frequencies. Estimations based on unfiltered consumption produce considerably more stable estimates of the EIS, regardless of the econometric approach and the type of consumption data used. Results also seem less sensitive to the presence of weak instruments, compared to officially reported data.