The Gender Wage Gap in Peru: Drivers, Evolution, and Heterogeneities. (with Giannina Vaccaro, Arlette Beltrán and Mariano Montoya) Social Inclusion, 10(1), 19-34 (2022)Decentralization and efficiency of subsidy targeting: Evidence from chiefs in rural Malawi(with Pascaline Dupas and Jonathan Robinson)Journal of public economics, 185, 104047 (2020)Note – Walking on Solid Ground: A Replication Study of ‘Housing Health and Happiness’(with Ramiro Burga, Jose Luis Flor Toro and Cesar Huaroto)The Journal of Development Studies, Vol. 55, No. 5, 1042-1046 (2019)On the peer effects of star students (with Manuel Barron and Gabriela Cuadra)Applied Economics Letters Vol. 25, No. 12, pages 821-825. (2018)Working PapersSchool Effects on College Outcomes in the Absence of Standardized Tests: The Role of Reputation vs. Effectiveness (NEW)(with Roman A. Zarate, Martin Carbajal, and Manuel Barrón)In contexts without standardized tests, college admissions could reward high school reputation over effectiveness, a phenomenon we explore in Peru. We first estimate the impact of selective public exam schools on college outcomes by leveraging the admissions mechanism in a single- and multiple-offers RDD. Despite no conclusive evidence of gains in learning, graduating from exam schools improves college applications, admissions, and enrollment, especially at top private universities. These findings are partly attributable to exam schools signaling students’ abilities. Estimates of the effects of marginally obtaining the IB diploma on college outcomes are consistent with the signaling mechanism. We next estimate and validate as causal value-added models on college outcomes for all schools in Peru. Compatible with the exam school effects, value-added on learning does not predict school effects on college outcomes after controlling for average graduates’ characteristics. Our findings underscore how information frictions can perpetuate inequality when standardized tests are unavailable. Gender Stereotypes and Peer Recognition (NEW)(with Manuel Barrón, Juan F. Castro and Roman. A. Zarate)This study explores how interventions aiming to reduce the gender gap in STEM fields affect peers' recognition of women's abilities. We study the effects of an intervention that combines STEM female role models and feedback on gender-science stereotypes on students' perceptions of each other. As peer influence could affect how individuals form opinions about others, we account for potential spillovers in a two-phase experimental design. In the first phase, classrooms are randomly assigned to different saturation levels of the intervention. In the second phase, conditional on classroom saturation levels, students are assigned to the treatment. The results show treatment but no spillover effects on attitudes towards women in STEM fields. However, we find evidence of treatment and spillover effects on recognizing women's math skills via more female nominations for the math component of an inter-classroom contest. This shift in nominations does not affect performance, reducing concerns about potential efficiency costs. Our results suggest that targeting peers to recognize women's STEM abilities can be highly effective due to the spillover effects when forming opinions about others. Under the Protection of the Andes: High altitude and COVID-19 mortality Submitted(with Pedro Francke and César Huaroto)While previous evidence has shown that high altitude areas have on average lower mortality rates associated to COVID-19 than low altitude areas, an open question is whether this is fully explained by differences in socio-demographic characteristics. Using monthly municipality data for Peru and Ecuador between 2019 and 2021, we conduct a difference in difference estimation that allows us to control for systematic differences across groups. We find that high-altitude municipalities have 42% and 62% lower mortality due to COVID-19 in comparison to low-altitude municipalities in Ecuador and Peru respectively. As expected, we find a stronger effect during earlier months of the pandemic.Measuring Sensitive Issues: Income Hiding in Rural Malawi SubmittedIn this paper I document the extent to which villagers hide income from local leaders and other villagers as a strategic behavior to avoid sharing. My main contribution is to document the extent and economic implications of income hiding practices. For this purpose, I use three different techniques to measures of income hiding: direct questions, list randomization, and, willingness to pay to hide income. I find that income hiding prevalence is between 16 to 27 percent depending on the measure employed. The local leader (16%), neighbors (16%), and friends (15%) are the main sources of money hiding practices; income hiding tactics include hiding in a secret location (65%), refraining from buying animals (12%), and requesting credit (11%), all of which have significant financial consequences.Selected Work in ProgressSchool Starting Age and Academic Progression(with Antonio Campos and Jesús Gutierrez)In this study we exploit exogenous differences in school starting age that arises from arbitrary cut-off dates for enrollment in first grade of primary. We leverage a rich administrative dataset to measure yearly enrollment, grade promotion, and dropouts. Similar to previous studies, we find that being of the youngest in their cohort reduces the probability of enrollment in the following year and the probability of grade promotion. Gender Differences in Time Use, Time Poverty and Employment (with Arlette Beltrán and Mauricio Koechlin)Peer Effects in Elite Higher Education(with Daniela Bresciani)