Judicial Risk and Credit Market Performance: Micro Evidence from Brazil Payroll Loans

A large body of literature has stressed the institution-development nexus as critical in explaining differences in countries' economic performance. The empirical evidence, however, has been mainly at the aggregate level, associating macro performance with measures of quality of institutions. This paper, by relating a judicial decision on the legality of payroll debit loans in Brazil to bank-level decision variables, provides micro evidence on how creditor legal protection affects market performance. Payroll loans are personal loans with principal and interests payments directly deducted from the borrowers' payroll check, which, in practice, makes a collateral out of future income. In June 2004, a high-level federal court upheld a regional court ruling that had declared payroll deduction illegal. Using personal loans without payroll deduction as a control group, we assess whether the ruling had an impact on market performance. Evidence indicates that it had an adverse impact on risk perception, interest rates, and amount lent.

Does drug illegality beget violence? Evidence from the crack-cocaine wave in São Paulo

Mimicking the so-called great American crime decline, violent crime in the state of São Paulo dropped sharply in the 2000s after rising steadily throughout the 1980s and 1990s. This paper evaluates the role of crack cocaine in explaining the aggregate dynamics in violence. Four facts are established. First, the aggregate data show a tight comovement between the prevalence of crack cocaine and homicides. Second, using city-level apprehension and possession data, I find a strong elasticity of violent crime with respect to crack cocaine after controlling for year fixed effects, city effects, and many time-varying covariates. I use the estimated elasticity to compute the contribution of crack cocaine to aggregate violence. Crack explains 30 percent of time series variation in the data. Third, only drug trafficking—not drug possession—has an impact on homicides. Finally, I find no impact on property crimes, a weaker impact on attempted murder, and, interestingly, a weak negative impact on aggravated assault. The theory suggests that both facts—only trafficking matters and crack affects only homicides, not property crime—can be rationalized only if drug-induced crime is driven by systemic violence induced by illegality itself. These results are important for policy because they suggest that violence will not follow the legalization of both the possession and trade of powdered cocaine or crack cocaine

AdS_4/CFT_3 Construction from Collective Fields

We pursue the construction of higher-spin theory in AdS_4 from CFT_3 of the O(N) vector model in terms of canonical collective fields. In null plane quantization an exact map is established between the two spaces. The coordinates of the AdS_4 space-time are generated from the collective coordinates of the bi-local field. This, in the light cone gauge, provides an exact one to one reconstruction of bulk AdS_4 space-time and higher-spin fields.Comment: 17 pages, no figures; v2: references added; v3: minor change

The effect of the availability of student credit on tuition: testing the Bennett hypothesis using evidence from a large-scale student loan program in Brazil

Exploring the expansion of FIES—a large student lending program in Brazil— we test whether eligibility for subsidized student lending causes tuition to rise, in accordance with the Bennett hypothesis. FIES rules created arguably exogenous variation in eligibility across different majors and higher education institutions, which we exploit in a difference-indifferences framework. Using unique information on tuition, we document that FIES eligibility caused tuition to rise. We then estimate a structural demand model to explore whether a reduction in the sensitivity of demand to price increases is one of the possible mechanisms behind this credit-driven tuition rise. Our results show that FIES expansion is associated with a reduction in the tuition elasticity of demand

Herdabilidade dos escores da condição corporal de vacas ao parto e ao desmame em um rebanho da raça Canchim.

O objetivo desse trabalho foi estimar parâmetros genéticos e fenotípicos dos escores da condição corporal das vacas ao parto (ECCVP) e ao desmame (ECCVD) do bezerro em um rebanho da raça Canchim. Foram analisados os dados de 2.727 ECCVP e 1.328 ECCVD de 910 e 652 vacas, respectivamente, pertencentes à Embrapa Pecuária Sudeste. Os componentes de variância foram estimados por meio da Inferência Bayesiana, utilizando-se o Amostrador de Gibbs. Os ECCVP e ECCVD foram analisados por um modelo animal considerando os efeitos genético aditivo direto, de ambiente permanente do animal e residual como aleatórios, além dos efeitos fixos de grupo de contemporâneas (ano e mês de parto), sexo do bezerro e a idade da vaca (em anos) como covariável (efeitos linear e quadrático). As médias posteriores para a herdabilidade e para a proporção da variância de ambiente permanente para o ECCVP (0,19 e 0,04, respectivamente) e ECCVD (0,29 e 0,02, respectivamente) indicam que existe variância genética aditiva que pode justificar a inclusão dessas características como critérios de seleção e que o efeito de ambiente temporário (residual) é responsável pela maior parte da variância fenotípica

Preliminary evaluation of equine respiratory disease in a region of New Zealand

Inflammatory airway disease (IAD) is one of the most widespread conditions affecting horses world-wide. Over-crowding, stabling conditions and exposure to irritants (such as bedding dust) have been thought to contribute to the development of IAD. Since the majority of sport horses in New Zealand are kept at pasture for prolonged periods, differing from intensive stabling conditions seen in other countries, variations in the type and frequency of respiratory pathologies might exist. In order to investigate this possibility, and determine the most common respiratory conditions affecting horses requiring endoscopic examination, this preliminary epidemiologic study was conducted. A retrospective analysis of 145 respiratory endoscopies was conducted including examinations made at 2 veterinary clinics from June 2010 to October 2012. Respiratory endoscopies results were initially classified as normal or abnormal. Abnormal results were further classified as: IAD, anatomical abnormalities, intermittent airway obstruction, trauma, miscellaneous abnormalities. Presence of tracheal secretions of any kind and quantity warranted classification as (IAD). Overall, 76.5% of the animals requiring a respiratory endoscopy demonstrated abnormalities which justified the examination: the majority of horses (42.7%) displayed some degree of IAD. Other common findings included intermittent dorsal displacement of the soft palate (6.9%); bleeding in the upper respiratory tract (3.45%), and laryngeal hemiplegia (15.2%). Inflammatory airway disease (IAD) is one of the most widespread conditions affecting horses world-wide and it is also prevalent in the population studied, despite different housing and managing practices observed in New Zealand in comparison to other countries. Further studies are needed to investigate subclinical abnormalities and the causes of the IAD in horses kept at pasture