Job Market Paper:
Transport and Structural Change in Latin America - 1900-2005 (New version forthcoming!)
This paper quantifies the long-term effects of sequential improvements to transport infrastructure, including railways and roads, on trade and structural changes in Latin America from 1900 to 2005. To this end, we calculate the transport index and elasticity of transport to each country. Then we develop a general equilibrium model with four sectors—the Natural Resource Sector (NRS), Manufacturing Sector (MS), Service Sector (SS), and Transport Sector (TS)—where transport infrastructure are essential for enabling exports and shaping labor allocation in the country. The model reproduces the observed expansion of export capacity and labor reallocation associated with network improvements. Counterfactual exercises that set at early 20th-century levels result in significantly lower trade volumes and a decline in labor in NRS, MS, and SS. This underscores the critical role of transportation on sectoral composition.
Work in Progress:
Demographic Transition, Aggregate Productivity Growth Slowdown, and Structural Change with V. Jerbashian (New version forthcoming!)
We derive an OLG model to study the effect of demographic transition and aggregate productivity growth slowdown on structural changes in employment in agriculture in European countries. The demographic transition in the model is associated with a significant fall in mortality probabilities, especially in old age, a fall in population growth, and a fall in labor productivity. Overall, together with the productivity growth slowdown, it implies an increase in the savings rate and a fall in the interest rate. The higher savings and investments directly affect the employment share in agriculture because the agricultural sector has higher capital intensity and capital-labor substitutability than the rest of the economy. We show that the demographic transition alone can account for about 15 percent of the observed fall in agricultural employment in the 1970-2020 period. Together with the TFP growth slowdown, it can account for about 35 percent of the observed fall in agricultural employment.
Working Paper:
Fiscal Multiplier in Bolivia: Do the Nationalization Process and the Unconventional Monetary Policy matter? with A. Lopez-Sanchez (New version forthcoming!)
This paper studies the fiscal multiplier in Bolivia considering key characteristics of the country and compares the results with common patterns shared with countries in the Latin American region regarding fiscal policy in times of crisis and unconventional monetary policy. This study finds that a positive shock to government spending increases output and its response is higher in the short term, with an impact multiplier of 0.74. This value is robust when the unconventional monetary policy is added, reaching a value of 0.73. Incorporating the nationalization in the analysis, the impact multiplier presents a higher value during the Pre-nationalization (1990-2005) than Post-nationalization (2006-2019), which implies a higher impact multiplier during the crisis period. These results suggest that the impact multiplier is non-linear between expansion and recession periods. A comparative analysis with Latin American countries also confirms that fiscal multipliers are higher in the short term and in the crisis period.
Work in Progress:
The impact of micro-credits on informal firms (microenterprises)
Farm Size and Agricultural Subsidies in Europe (with V. Jerbashian)
Migration and Structural Change in Latin America (with N. Chamseddine)
Debt, Financial Assets and Structural Change (with C. Belloni)