Breno Sampaio

Breno Sampaio is Associate Professor of Economics at the Federal University of Pernambuco/UFPE in Brazil. He is also the Director of the Group for the Economic Evaluation of Public Policies (GAPPE.org), Researcher Fellow at IZA, Research Fellow at the CLEAN Unit for Economic Analysis of Crime - Baffi-Carefin Centre, Bocconi University, Research Fellow at the Institute for Mobility and Social Development (IMDS), Invited Researcher at the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at UNU-WIDER (United Nations) and a receipt of an Academic Productivity Fellowship from CNPq/Brazil.

Breno received his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign/UIUC, and has worked as a consultant for the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), the World Bank, the University of Essex/UK and the United Nations. Breno has also assisted several Brazilian Ministries in data management and policy evaluation. His main research interests include labor economics, education economics, crime and health economics and development economics.

Breno has published in several important academic journals, such as Econometrica, Review of Economic Studies, Journal of Labor Economics, Management Science, Journal of Public Economics, American Journal of Agricultural Economics, Journal of Health Economics, among others. He has been awarded the CAPES Thesis Award in 2018 and in 2024, and Second Prize Award (Honorable Mention) in 2025, for having supervised the best doctoral thesis in economic sciences in Brazil, the 2022 Haralambos Simeonidis Award, given annually to the authors of the best article published by a Brazilian, and taught the 2022 Mario Henrique Simonsen Memorial Lecture, an honor given annually by the Econometric Society to two of the most promising economists in Latin America under the age of 40.

Vitae

Mobility Atlas Brazil
The Mobility Atlas Brazil is the result of a collaboration between researchers at GAPPE/UFPE, Clean/Bocconi and The Institute for Mobility and Social Development (IMDS). Based on our work "Intergenerational Mobility in the Land of Inequality (with D. Britto, A. Fonseca, P. Pinotti and L. Warwar)", we created the Brazilian Income Mobility Database. The platform aims to help researchers, policymakers, and community members understand the factors contributing to social mobility and develop targeted solutions to improve opportunities for children in disadvantaged areas.

Work in progress:

Parenthood and Productivity: Evidence from Administrative data in Brazil

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Bruno Ferman, Alexandre Fonseca, Caio de Holanda and Lucas Warwar)

Household Response to Health Shocks and its Intergenerational Consequences

(with Diogo G. C. Britto and Maria Éliude)

Conditional Cash Transfers and Intergenerational Mobility

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Alexandre Fonseca, Paolo Pinotti, and Lucas Warwar)

Family Matters: Politics, Public Procurement, and Jobs in Brazil

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Alexandre Fonseca, Manoel Gehrke and Paolo Pinotti)

Informality and the Costs of Children in Developing Countries

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Alexandre Fonseca, Fernando Mattar, Dimitri Szerman, and Gabriel Ulyssea)
Winner of the STEG/CEPR Small Research Grant.

Mental Health Centers and Educational Outcomes of Children

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Bilge Erten, Pinar Keskin, Rodrigo Pinto)

Working papers:

Does Decentralization Increase Tax Revenues? Evidence from Land Taxation in Brazil

(with Arthur Bragança, Diogo G. C. Britto, Alexandre Fonseca, Davi Moura, André Sant'Anna, and Dimitri Szerman) [draft]

A Few Bad Apples? Criminal Charges, Political Careers, and Policy Outcomes

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Gianmarco Danielle, Marco Le Moglie and Paolo Pinotti) [draft]

Small Children, Big Problems: Childbirth and Crime

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, R. Hsu Rocha, and P. Pinotti). [IZA Discussion Paper]

Minimum Wages and the Human Capital of the Next Generation

(with Daniel Araujo, Bladimir Carrillo, and Wilman Iglesias)

Job Loss, Unemployment Insurance and Health: Evidence from Brazil

(with Guilherme Amorim, Diogo G. C. Britto and Alexandre Fonseca ) [draft]

The Review of Economics and Statistics, Revision Requested.

Intergenerational Mobility in the Land of Inequality

(with Diogo G. C. Britto, Alexandre Fonseca, Paolo Pinotti, and Lucas Warwar) [draft]

The Review of Economics and Statistics, Revision Requested.

Economic Production and the Spread of Supernatural Beliefs

(with Daniel Araujo and Bladimir Carrillo). [IZA Discussion Paper] [draft]

Daylight Saving Lives: The effect of Daylight Saving Time on homicides

(with W. Toro and R. Tigre). [SSRN working paper]

Journal of Law & Economics, 2nd Revision Requested.

The Kids Aren't Alright: Job Loss and Children's Outcomes within and beyond Schools

(with Diogo G. C. Britto and Caique Melo) [draft]

Review of Economic Studies, Revision Requested.

Publications:

Duryea S., R. Ribas, B. Sampaio and G. Trevisan. "The Long-Term Effect of Admission to a Top-Quality University on Crime.

Journal of Labor Economics, forthcoming.

Bhalotra, S., D. G. C. Britto, P. Pinotti and B. Sampaio. "Job Displacement, Unemployment Benefits and Domestic Violence. [IZA Discussion Paper]

Review of Economic Studies, forthcoming.

Ribas, R., B. Sampaio, and G. Trevisan. (2025) "The Impact of Peer Performance and Relative Rank on Managerial Career Attainment: Evidence from College Students." [IZA Discussion Paper][Link]

Management Science, 71(5): 4510-4531.

D. G. C. Britto, L. Germinetti, F. Gerard, J. Naritomi and B. Sampaio. (2025). "Access to Justice and Social Protection." [Link]

American Economic Association, Papers and Proceedings, 115: 329-334.

Duryea, S., R. Ribas, B. Sampaio, G. R. Sampaio, and G. Trevisan. (2023). Who Benefits from Tuition-Free, Top-Quality Universities? Evidence from Brazil." [IZA Discussion Paper][Link].

Economics of Education Review, 95(102423): 1-14.

Da Mata, D., L. Emanuel, V. Pereira and B. Sampaio. (2023). "Climate Adaptation Policies and Infant Health: Evidence from a Water Policy in Brazil." [IZA Discussion Paper][Link].

Journal of Public Economics, 220(104835): 1-11.

Britto, D. G. C., P. Pinotti and B. Sampaio. (2022). "The Effect of Job Loss and Unemployment Insurance on Crime in Brazil." [link].

Winner of the 2019 Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation Grant.

Econometrica, 90 (4): 1393-1423. (lead article).

Amorim, G., R. Costa Lima, and B. Sampaio. (2022). "Broadband Internet and Protests: Investigating the Occupy Movement." [link].

Information Economics and Policy, 60(100982): 1-19.

Araújo, D, B. Carrillo and B. Sampaio. (2021). "Long-Run Effects of Iodine Supplementation on Education and Labor Market Outcomes in Tanzania." [IZA Discussion Paper][Link].

Journal of Health Economics, 79: 1-18. (lead article).

B. Carrillo, D. da Mata, L. Emanuel, D. Lopes and B. Sampaio. (2020). "Avoidable environmental disasters and infant health: Evidence from the Mariana mining collapse in Brazil." [Link]

Health Economics, 29 (12): 1786-1794.

R. Ribas, G. Trevisan and B. Sampaio. (2020). "Short- and Long-term Effects of Class Assignment: Evidence from a Flagship University in Brazil." [Link].

Runner up for the 2018 SBE Best Paper in Applied Microeconomics. Featured in GlobalDev.

Labour Economics, 64(101835), 1-13.

Dantas, R. N. D., G. Duarte, R. M. Silveira Neto, B. Sampaio. (2018). "Height restrictions and housing prices: A difference-in-discontinuity approach." [Link].

Economics Letters, 164, 58-61.

Tigre, R., B. Sampaio, and T. Menezes. (2017). "The Impact of Commuting Time on Youth´s School Performance." [Link].

Journal of Regional Science, 57 (1): 28-47.

Rocco, L., and B. Sampaio. (2016). "Are Handheld Cell-Phone and Texting Bans Really Effective in Reducing Fatalities?" [Link].

Empirical Economics, 51 (2): 853-876.

Matta, R., R. Ribas, B. Sampaio, and G. Sampaio. (2016). "The effect of age at school entry on college admission and earnings: A regression-discontinuity approach." [Link].

IZA Journal of Labor Economics, 5 (9): 1-25.

Toro, W., R. Tigre, and B. Sampaio. (2015). "Daylight Saving Time and Incidence of Myocardial Infarction: Evidence from a Regression Discontinuity Design." [Link].

Economics Letters, 136, 1-4. (lead article).

Sampaio, B., G. R. Sampaio, and Y. Sampaio. (2013). "On Estimating the Effects of Immigrant Legalization: Do U.S. Agricultural Workers Really Benefit?" [Link].

American Journal of Agricultural Economics, 95 (4): 932-948.

Other papers:

Fu, Xiaowen, Tsui, K. W., Sampaio, B., Tan, D. (2021). "Do airport activities affect regional economies? Regional Analysis of New Zealand's airport system."

Regional Studies, 55 (4): 707-722.

Duryea, S., De Freitas, L. B., Ozemela, L., Sampaio, B., Sampaio, G. R., Trevisan, G. (2019). "Universities and Intergenerational Social Mobility in Brazil: Examining Patterns by Race and Gender."

Journal of Economics, Race, and Policy, 2: 240-256.

Zhang, Y. Sampaio, B., Fu, X., Huang, Z. (2018). "Pricing dynamics between airline groups with dual-brand servicies."

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 112, 46-59.

Froehlich, A. G., Melo, A. S., Sampaio, B. (2018). "Comparing the Profitability of Organic and Convenctional Production in Family Farming: Empirical Evidence from Brazil."

Ecological Economics, 150, 307-314.

Ellison, R. B., A. B. Ellison, S. P. Greaves, and B. Sampaio. (2017). “Electronic ticketing systems as a mechanism for travel behaviour change? Evidence from Sydney’s Opal Card.” [Link].

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 99 (5): 80-93.

Mulley, C., Sampaio, B., Ma, L. (2017). "South Eastern Busway Network in Brisbane, Australia."

Transportation Research Record, 2647: 41-49.

Oliveira, R., K. H. Moura, J. Viana, R. Tigre and B. Sampaio. (2015). “Commute duration and health: Empirical evidence from Brazil.” [Link]

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 80, 62-75.

Sampaio, B. (2014). “Identifying Peer States for Transportation Policy Analysis with an Application to New York’s Handheld Cell Phone Ban.” [Link]

Transportmetrica A: Transport Science, 10 (1): 1-14. (lead article).

Guimaraes, J., Sampaio, B. (2013). "Family Brackground and Student's Achievement on a University Entrance Exam in Brazil.”

Education Economics, 80, 62-75.

Cavalcanti, T., Guimaraes, J., Sampaio, B. (2010). "Barriers To Skill Acquisition in Brazil: Public and Private Schools Students Performance in a Public University Entrance Exam.”

Quarterly Review of Economics and Finance, 50, 395-407.

Sampaio, B. (2010). “On the Identification of the Effect of Prohibiting Hand-Held Cell Phone Use while Driving: Comment.” [Link]

Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, 44 (9): 766-770.