Las remesas son más importantes que nunca durante la crisis del COVID-19

Las remesas son un factor clave en el desarrollo de personas y comunidades en países receptores, y un gran descenso en los envíos debido al COVID-19 puede tener consecuencias graves tanto en la política como en la sociedad. Se hace urgente digitalizar, abaratar y proteger los servicios de envío para mitigar estos impactos negativos, escribe Covadonga Meseguer (ICADE, Universidad Pontificia Comillas

Learning and economic policy choices with an application to IMF agreements

I discuss the role of learning in economic policy choices. I test whether choices of policies are driven by experience under them. A Bayesian approach is adopted to tackle this issue and hence, the paper is also an account of the possibilities and limits of this approach. The decision to sign IMF agreements is used as illustration. The model of rational learning suggests that governments are more likely to enter into agreements with the IMF after learning from their own and from the world experience that average results under agreements are better. Also, governments are prone to take risks when they observe very good performers under IMF agreements at the world and at the regional level. However, they are unlikely to continue under a policy that is costly as soon as growth resumes in the region. The rationalistic reading of this behavior is that governments avoid remaining under a costly policy in isolation. A more detailed research is needed in order to adjudicate among this account of switches and an alternative one that emphasizes deviations to the rational rule as the ultimate cause of choices

Return migration, crime, and electoral engagement in Mexico

Since 2006, the Great Recession and tighter migration policies in the U.S. have increased the rates of return migration to Mexico. Scholars debate whether high rates of return motivate greater electoral engagement via the democratic norms returnees may bring back with them. An alternative account holds that returnees are seen as dissimilar by their non-migrant co-nationals, causing returnees to disengage from politics. We contribute to this debate using municipal data on voter turnout and on rates of return migration for the case of Mexico from 2000 to 2010. Relying on an instrumental strategy that exploits migrants’ exposure to changes in unemployment rates as an exogenous predictor for return, we find robust evidence that high rates of return result in less electoral participation in presidential and local elections. Besides, electoral disengagement seems to be intensified by the presence of criminal violence, which surged during our period of analysis. Return migration may have a positive impact on other modes of political participation; but at least when it comes to voting, our research aligns with the pessimistic camp of the debate in that return migration increases electoral apathy

La difusión de las privatizaciones en la OCDE y en América Latina: ¿un proceso de aprendizaje?

En este trabajo, analizo si 37 gobiernos de la OCDE y América Latina han privatizadocomo resultado de un aprendizaje de la experiencia en otros países. Alternativamente,contrasto si la convergencia en la decisión de privatizar ha tenido que ver con el seguimientode tendencias internacionales o con la presión ejercida por organismos internacionales.De acuerdo con los resultados de este trabajo, tanto el aprendizaje como laimitación parecen haber sido dos motivos robustos para explicar las privatizaciones enambas regiones durante los años ochenta y sobre todo los noventa. Sin embargo, no sepuede decir lo mismo acerca de la presión internacional. Ni los acuerdos del Fondo MonetarioInternacional ni la pertenencia a la Unión Europea parecen haber influido en lasdecisiones de privatizar. Además, este trabajo muestra que en América Latina, las privatizacionesse han visto favorecidas por regímenes poco democráticos mientras que enla OCDE, lo han sido por gobiernos de centro-izquierda, aunque débilmente. Finalmente,la tendencia privatizadora aparece relacionada con la caída de los regímenes comunistasdel centro y este de Europa, pero sólo en América Latina

The limits of material benefits: remittances and pro-Americanism in Mexico

We explore how the reception of remittances affects perceptions of the bilateral relationship between Mexico and the U.S. Scholars have claimed that the economic benefits of the relationship with the U.S. prevail over imperialistic concerns stemming from the asymmetry of power between the two countries. Empirical research shows that Latin American public opinion is indeed more supportive of the U.S. than the theory predicts. We identify, however, two gaps in this literature: first, scholars have explored the determinants of generic expressions of sentiment toward the U.S., overlooking more concrete instances of cooperation between the two countries. Second, scholars have focused on trade and investment and have ignored how the material gains of emigration shape attitudes toward the U.S. Using novel survey data on the bilateral relationship between Mexico and the U.S., our paper fills these two gaps. On one hand, we find that while the reception of remittances correlates positively with good sentiments toward the U.S., those that receive remittances are consistently more opposed to cooperation with the U.S. in the fight against drug trafficking. We argue that this finding can be explained by the different nature of the migratory phenomenon, and the connection between anti-drug trafficking policies and the close scrutiny of illegal flows of money and people

Financial remittances, trans-border conversations, and the state

How does the reception of remittances change the views of those left behind? In this paper, we compare the impact of financial remittances (transmission of money) with the impact of social remittances (transmission of ideas and values) on preferences about the role of the state in the economy (in particular, the role of the state in creating jobs, reducing inequality, and securing citizens’ well-being). Using data from the Latin American Public Opinion Project (2008–2010), we find that social learning via cross-border communication is positively associated with preference for an enhanced role of the state

Collective Remittances and the State: The 3x1 Program in Mexican Municipalities

The Mexican 3x1 Program for Migrants is a matching fund scheme that seeks to direct the money sent by hometown associations abroad (collective remittances) to productive uses. The federal, state and municipal governments contribute to the program multiplying by three the contributions sent by migrants abroad. Using municipal level data on program participation for the period 2002-2006, we evaluate the program’s capacity to target the poorest municipalities. Since migration has a nonlinear relationship with poverty and marginality, a program that unconditionally responds to project initiatives from migrant organizations is bound to be regressive due to self-selection bias. Indeed, poorer municipalities are less likely to participate and they also receive lower amounts and fewer projects than relatively richer localities. Moreover, we find evidence of a partisan bias: states and municipalities ruled by the PAN are significantly more likely to participate in the program, and electoral support for the PAN is associated with more funds or projects awarded. We argue that substantial changes should be implemented for the program to be a truly progressive poverty reduction tool.Latin American Studie

What do you fear? Anti-immigrant sentiment in Latin America

In this article, we study the material determinants of anti-immigrant sentiment in Latin America. Based on new data on immigration to non-Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) countries, we use the workhorse distributive theories that anticipate who wins and who loses from immigration and test their predictive capacity in labor-abundant countries. We exploit the variation in regional immigration rates, in the skill composition of natives versus migrants, and in the relative generosity of Latin American welfare states. We find that fears of labor-market competition are weak predictors of anti-immigrant sentiment. In contrast, fears of greater tax burdens are strong and robust predictors of anti-immigrant sentiment. We conclude that studying Latin American public opinion opens new avenues for theorizing about anti-immigrant sentiment in developing countries

Sending money home in times of crime: the case of Mexico

We explore at the municipality level how the climate of criminal violence has affected the flow of remittances to Mexico. Using a panel of municipalities in the years 2006 and 2010, we find that drug-related crimes and overall rates of homicides have reduced the percentage of families that receive remittances. This result is robust to controlling for net migration, political variables, and traditional socioeconomic explanations of remittance sending. It is also robust to potential threats to validity. We interpret this result as suggestive of self-interested concerns when sending money home amidst a climate of rampant violence. Nonetheless, mixed motivations to remit are evident in our analysis