The relationship between school violence and student proficiency

School violence has recently become a central concern among teachers, students, students' parents andpolicymakers. Violence can induce behaviors on educational agents that go against the goals ofimproving the quality of education and increasing school attendance. In fact, there is evidence thatschool environmental characteristics and student performance and behavior at school are related.Although school violence may have a direct impact on students’ performance, such impact has not yetbeen quantified. In this paper, we investigate this issue using Brazilian data and show that, on average,students who attended more violent schools had worse proficiency on a centralized test carried out bythe Brazilian Ministry of Education, even when we controlled for school, class, teachers and studentcharacteristics. We also show that school violence affects more the students from the bottom of theproficiency distribution. Furthermore, we find out that besides the direct effect on student proficiency,it seems that school violence has an indirect effect on it operating through teacher turnover. Indeed, weshow that the occurrence of violent episodes in a school decreases the probability of a class in thatschool having only one teacher during the academic year, and increases the probability of that classhaving more than one teacher (teacher turnover).

O efeito do ensino profissionalizante sobre a probabilidade de inserção no mercado de trabalho e sobre a renda no período pré-planfor

A falta de qualificação da população brasileira tem sido muito criticada e estudossobre a qualificação da mão-de-obra no Brasil são considerados prioritários no debatesobre desenvolvimento econômico. Com o intuito de contribuir nesse sentido, este artigoinvestiga se o ensino profissionalizante aumentou a probabilidade de inserção profissionale a renda dos egressos até meados da década de 1990, comparativamente aos que nãocursaram esse tipo de ensino. Foram utilizados os microdados da Pesquisa sobre Padrõesde Vida (PPV) de 1996 do IBGE, que tem informações sobre educação profissionalizantee é a única no Brasil que pode ser considerada geograficamente abrangente, uma vez querepresenta as regiões SE e NE. Não há no Brasil outro estudo geograficamente abrangentesobre esse tema. Os resultados revelam que os egressos de cursos profissionalizantes denível básico tinham renda esperada 37% maior que a de indivíduos que não fizeramesse tipo de curso no ensino fundamental. Por outro lado, para os egressos do ensinoprofissionalizante de nível tecnológico, observa-se uma redução de 27% da renda esperada,comparativamente aos que não fizeram esse tipo de curso no ensino superior. Os cursostécnicos oferecidos em empresas reduzem a probabilidade de desemprego e têm umforte impacto positivo sobre os rendimentos. Nestes casos, é bastante provável que ostrabalhadores mais hábeis sejam selecionados. Assim sendo, ainda há espaço na literaturanacional para estudos sobre o tema que controlem as habilidades individuais, como estudoscom dados de painel.

Incidental Adaptation: The Role of Non-climate Regulations

When a non-climate institution, policy, or regulation corrects a pre-existing market failure that would be exacerbated by climate change, it may also incidentally induce climate adaptation. This regulation-induced adaptation can have large positive welfare effects. We develop a tractable analytical framework of a corrective regulation where the market failure interacts with climate, highlighting the mechanism of regulation-induced adaptation: reductions in the climate-exacerbated effects of pre-existing market failures. We demonstrate this empirically for the US from 1980 to 2013, showing that ambient ozone concentrations increase with rising temperatures, but that such increase is attenuated in counties that are out of attainment with the Clean Air Act’s ozone standards. Adaptation in nonattainment counties reduced the impact of a 1 °C increase in climate normal temperature on ozone concentration by 0.64 parts per billion, or about one-third of the total impact. Over half of that effect was induced by the standard, implying a regulation-induced welfare benefit of $412–471 million per year by mid-century under current warming projections

O Efeito do Ensino Profissionalizante sobre a Probabilidade de Inserção no Mercado de Trabalho e sobre a Renda no Período Pré-PLANFOR

A falta de qualificação da população brasileira tem sido muito criticada e estudos sobre a qualificação da mão-de-obra no Brasil são considerados prioritários no debate sobre desenvolvimento econômico. Com o intuito de contribuir nesse sentido, este artigo investiga se o ensino profissionalizante aumentou a probabilidade de inserção profissional e a renda dos egressos até meados da década de 1990, comparativamente aos que não cursaram esse tipo de ensino. Foram utilizados os microdados da Pesquisa sobre Padrões de Vida (PPV) de 1996 do IBGE, que tem informações sobre educação profissionalizante e é a única no Brasil que pode ser considerada geograficamente abrangente, uma vez que representa as regiões SE e NE. Não há no Brasil outro estudo geograficamente abrangente sobre esse tema. Os resultados revelam que os egressos de cursos profissionalizantes de nível básico tinham renda esperada 37% maior que a de indivíduos que não fizeram esse tipo de curso no ensino fundamental. Por outro lado, para os egressos do ensino profissionalizante de nível tecnológico, observa-se uma redução de 27% da renda esperada, comparativamente aos que não fizeram esse tipo de curso no ensino superior. Os cursos técnicos oferecidos em empresas reduzem a probabilidade de desemprego e têm um forte impacto positivo sobre os rendimentos. Nestes casos, é bastante provável que os trabalhadores mais hábeis sejam selecionados. Assim sendo, ainda há espaço na literatura nacional para estudos sobre o tema que controlem as habilidades individuais, como estudos com dados de painel.Ensino Profissionalizante, Avaliação de Programas Sociais, Modelo Multinomial Logístico.

A unifying approach to measuring climate change impacts and adaptation

We develop a unifying approach to estimating climate impacts and adaptation, and apply it to study the impact of climate change on local air pollution. Economic agents are usually constrained when responding to daily weather shocks, but may adjust to long-run climatic changes. By simultaneously exploiting variation in weather and climate, we identify both the short- and long-run impacts on economic outcomes, and measure adaptation directly as the difference between those responses. As a result, we identify adaptation without making extrapolations of weather responses over time or space, and overcome omitted variable bias concerns from prior approaches

Assortative Matching or Exclusionary Hiring? The Impact of Firm Policies on Racial Wage Differences in Brazil

A growing body of research shows that firms' employment and wage-setting policies contribute to wage inequality and pay disparities between groups. We measure the effects of these policies on racial pay differences in Brazil. We find that nonwhites are less likely to work at establishments that pay more to all race groups, a pattern that explains about 20% of the white-nonwhite wage gap for both genders. The pay premiums offered by different employers are also compressed for nonwhites relative to whites, contributing another 5% of the overall gap. We then ask how much of the under-representation of nonwhites at higher-paying workplaces is due to the selective skill mix at these establishments. Using a counterfactual based on the observed skill distribution at each establishment and the nonwhite shares in different skill groups in the local labor market, we conclude that assortative matching accounts for about two-thirds of the under-representation gap for both men and women. The remainder reflects an unexplained preference for white workers at higher-paying establishments. The wage losses associated with unexplained sorting and differential wage setting are largest for nonwhites with the highest levels of general skills, suggesting that the allocative costs of race-based preferences may be relatively large in Brazil

The unintended impact of ecosystem preservation on greenhouse gas emissions: Evidence from environmental constraints on hydropower development in the United States.

Many countries have passed environmental laws aiming at preserving natural ecosystems, such as the Endangered Species Act of 1973 in the United States. Although those regulations seem to have improved preservation, they may have had unintended consequences in energy production. Here we show that while environmental constraints on hydropower may have preserved the wilderness and wildlife by restricting the development of hydroelectric projects, they led to more greenhouse gas emissions. Environmental regulations gave rise to a replacement of hydropower, which is a renewable, relatively low-emitting source of energy, with conventional fossil-fuel power, which is highly polluting. Our estimates indicate that, on average, each megawatt of fossil fuel power-generating capacity added to the grid because of environmental constraints on hydropower development led to an increase in annual carbon dioxide emissions of about 1,400 tons. Environmental regulations focusing only on the preservation of ecosystems appear to have encouraged electric utilities to substitute dirtier fuels for hydropower in electricity generation

The Power of Hydroelectric Dams: Agglomeration Spillovers

<p>How much of the geographic clustering of economic activity is attributable to agglomeration spillovers as opposed to natural advantages? I present evidence on this question using data on the long-run effects of large scale hydroelectric dams built in the U.S. over the 20th century, obtained through a unique comparison between counties with or without dams but with similar hydropower potential. Until mid-century, the availability of cheap local power from hydroelectric dams conveyed an important advantage that attracted industry and population. By the 1950s, however, these advantages were attenuated by improvements in the efficiency of thermal power generation and the advent of high tension transmission lines. Using a novel combination of synthetic control methods and event-study techniques, I show that, on average, dams built before 1950 had substantial short run effects on local population and employment growth, whereas those built after 1950 had no such effects. Moreover, the impact of pre-1950 dams persisted and continued to grow after the advantages of cheap local hydroelectricity were attenuated, suggesting the presence of important agglomeration spillovers. Over a 50 year horizon, I estimate that at least one half of the long run effect of pre-1950 dams is due to spillovers. The estimated short and long run effects are highly robust to alternative procedures for selecting synthetic controls, to controls for confounding factors such as proximity to transportation networks, and to alternative sample restrictions, such as dropping dams built by the Tennessee Valley Authority or removing control counties with environmental regulations. I also find small local agglomeration effects from smaller dam projects, and small spillovers to nearby locations from large dams.</p

Air Pollution, Power Grid, and Infant Health: Evidence from the Shutdown of TVA Nuclear Power Plants in the 1980s

When environmental regulations focus on a subset of power plants, the ultimate goal of human health protection may not be reached. Because power plants are interconnected through the electrical grid, excessive scrutiny of a group of facilities may generate more pollution out of another group, with potential deleterious effects to public health. I study the impact of the shutdown of nuclear power plants in the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) in the 1980s, on health outcomes at birth. After the Three Mile Island accident in 1979, the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) intensifies inspections in nuclear facilities leading to the shutdown of many of them, including Browns Ferry and Sequoyah in the TVA area. I first show that, in response to the shutdown, electricity generation shifts one-to-one to coal-fired power plants within TVA, increasing air pollution in counties where they are located. Second, I find that babies born after the shutdown have both lower birth weight and lower gestational age in the counties most affected by the shutdown. Third, I highlight the presence of substantial heterogeneity in those effects depending on how much more electricity those coal-powered facilities are generating in response to the shutdown. Lastly, I use the heterogeneity in response to the shutdown to provide suggestive evidence on the "safe" threshold of exposure to total suspended particles (TSP), which may help the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set the National Ambient Air Quality Standards (NAAQS) for particulate matters (PM). It may also help regulators to incentivize power companies to respond optimally to unexpected energy shortages.</p