In the 1990s, there was a growing process of administrative decentralization that culminated in the creation of 1,016 new municipalities in Brazil. The aim of this paper is to verify the impact of the municipal secessions on the public expenditures and its association with economies of scale. Based on a Differences-in-Differences methodology, the obtained set of evidence indicates that those municipalities that underwent a secession process increased their per capita capital expenditures by 14.7 percent. In addition, we show evidence that strongly suggests that this increase in expenses can be explained by a reduction in economies of scale and rent-seeking behavior.

O objetivo desse trabalho é avaliar a experiência do PRONAF entre os agricultores do Estado de Pernambuco. São utilizados dados sobre aproximadamente 4.500 agricultores familiares desse Estado, coletados em 2001, divididos entre beneficiários do programa e um grupo de controle. Os resultados são apresentados para a amostra total, excluídos os assentados, e por grupo do PRONAF (B, C e D). As estimativas são corrigidas para a existência de viés de participação com a utilização do método de Propensity Score. Os resultados indicam que o PRONAF mostrou-se pouco eficaz em Pernambuco até esse período. Quando as diferenças de características e probabilidades de participação do programa são consideradas, os resultados indicam que o programa não tem gerado um impacto significativo para o público-alvo em Pernambuco.
The main goal of the paper is to evaluate the experience of PRONAF on the farmers of the state of Pernambuco. The data used include information on, approximately, 4.500 farmers from this State. The results are presented for the whole sample, excluding the "assentados", and by groups (B, C e D). The estimates are corrected for the existence of participation bias through the use propensity score method. The effectiveness of the program is also considered in the analysis. When the differences of characteristics and probabilities of participation are factored in, the main findings point that, although effective, the program has not shown significant impacts on the considered state

Gender differentials in commuting have been reported in the literature, often couched within the household responsibility hypothesis. This hypothesis attributes shorter commutes to females due to a disproportionate load of household responsibilities. The objective of the present study is to report research regarding commuting time in São Paulo Metropolitan Region, in Brazil. Based on microdata from the Demographic Census of 2010 the focus of the present study is on the role of marital status and presence of dependents on gender differentials in commuting time. Specifically, the research seeks to determine whether there is empirical support in this region for the household responsibility hypothesis. The results suggest that marital status exerts a stronger influence on the commuting time of working women, with the number of dependents (children and elderly) exerting a smaller influence on commuting time. Gender differentials are observed also for single and formerly married working females, which suggests other cultural or environmental factors not fully captured by the household responsibility hypothesis. Most studies, however, are set in North America. This research contributes towards the development of a broader, international knowledge foundation regarding gender and commuting patterns.

In this paper, we present a detailed and comprehensive analysis of the location patterns of manufacturing industries in Brazil using a distance‐based measure and micro‐geographic panel data for a 10‐year period. Our results show that 89.9% and 91% of manufacturing at the 3‐digit level have statistically significant localization for 2006 and 2015, respectively, and that these patterns remain high when we consider 4‐digit classification. High‐tech industries have location patterns at short distances, being localized mainly in large urban areas, while low‐tech industries are also localized at long distances. We also present evidence that agglomeration economies affect the degree of spatial concentration.

Resumo Este artigo tem como objetivo analisar a influência da vizinhança sobre o desempenho escolar dos alunos da rede pública de ensino do Recife. Especificamente, o trabalho investiga empiricamente a existência de uma relação entre o desempenho do aluno e as características de sua vizinhança e os mecanismos pelos quais atua essa influência. Para tanto, utiliza-se a base de dados da Fundaj (2013) para construir, de forma pioneira no Brasil, as variáveis de vizinhança dos alunos da cidade considerando pequenas escalas geográficas. Os resultados dos exercícios econométricos indicam que os alunos residentes em uma vizinhança mais privilegiada tendem a apresentar, em média, melhor desempenho em matemática. Na análise que considera a composição dos pares de vizinhança, os resultados sugerem que a proporção de repetentes influenciaria o desempenho de matemática.

Routine activities theory establishes that the greater the exposure to public spaces with weak guardianship the higher the probability of being a victim of urban violence. Using a unique dataset for the year 2009 that includes all Brazilian metropolitan regions, we provide evidence for the causal effect of a long commute time on the chance of being a victim of violence in these urban centres. The set of evidence was obtained by applying propensity score matching techniques to create counterfactuals and is robust to different robustness checks and sensitivity analysis.

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This article analyses the influence of both contextual and individual urban characteristics on violence victimisation in Brazilian cities. A multilevel approach is used to capture the effects of the urban contextual variables with respect to the probability of becoming a robbery victim in Brazilian urban centres. The results demonstrate that factors associated with social context, such as proportions of cities’ recent migrants or female-headed households, affect victimisation, as do individual characteristics. Furthermore, based on an analysis of the intra-class correlation coefficients, the context produces a non-negligible amount of variability.