Is There Gender Bias Among Voters? Evidence from the Chilean Congressional Elections

I exploit the unique institution of gender-segregated voting booths in Chile, allowing the use of actual voting data, instead of self-reported surveys, to test for gender bias among voters. I find evidence of a small but significant negative gender bias: women overall are less likely than men to vote for female candidates. The effect is mainly driven by center-right voters. Selection and candidates’ quality do not explain away the results. These results are consistent with a model in which female and male legislators vote alike, and women voters living in municipalities where traditional gender roles are more prevalent have a preference for center-right male candidates instead of female candidates

To Pill or not to Pill? Access to Emergency Contraception and Contraceptive Behaviour

We examine the effects of free-of-charge availability of emergency contraception on contraceptive behaviour in Chile. Using a survey of individuals 15 to 29, we exploit variation in availability at the municipality level as a consequence of legal and judicial decisions in the late 2000s. We find an increase in the use of emergency contraception in municipalities in which it was available through the public health system, but also an increase in the use of other methods of hormonal, pre-coital contraception, and a decrease of more traditional contraceptive methods. This effect is concentrated among groups with a low starting use of contraceptives, who may benefit from the contact with the health services. Unlike previous results for developed countries, our results indicate that there is scope for an effect of emergency contraception in settings with low starting levels of contraceptive use, and a significant potential for policies to increase adoption of regular contraception.We are grateful to Isabel Jacas for excellent research assistance, as well as to participants in seminars and conferences in University of Sheffield, University of Edinburgh, ESPE, SAEe, and SMYE. Funding from the Centre for Social Conflict and Cohesion Studies (CONICYT/FONDAP/15130009) is greatly acknowledged. This research was approved by the University of Chile Institutional Review Board on October 24, 2018. All remaining errors are our ow

To pill or not to pill? access to emergency contraception and contraceptive behaviour

We examine the effects of free-of-charge availability of emergency contraception on contraceptive behaviour in Chile. Using a survey of individuals 15 to 29, we exploit variation in availability at the municipality level as a consequence of legal and judicial decisions in the late 2000s. We find an increase in the use of emergency contraception in municipalities in which it was available through the public health system, but also an increase in the use of other methods of hormonal, pre-coital contraception, and a decrease of more traditional contraceptive methods. This effect is concentrated among groups with a low starting use of contraceptives, who may benefit from the contact with the health services. Unlike previous results for developed countries, our results indicate that there is scope for an effect of emergency contraception in settings with low starting levels of contraceptive use, and a significant potential for policies to increase adoption of regular contraception.We are grateful to Isabel Jacas for excellent research assistance, as well as to participants in seminars and conferences in University of Sheffield, University of Edinburgh, ESPE, SAEe, and SMYE. Funding from the Centre for Social Conflict and Cohesion Studies (CONICYT/FONDAP/15130009) is greatly acknowledged. This research was approved by the University of Chile Institutional Review Board on October 24, 2018. All remaining errors are our ow

Does facial structure explain differences in students evaluations of teaching? the role of perceived dominance

Dominance is usually viewed as a positive male attribute, but this is not typically the case for women. Using a novel dataset of teacher evaluations in a school of Business and Economics of a selective university, we construct the face width-to-height ratio (fWHR) as a proxy for dominance to assess whether individuals with a higher ratio obtain better student evaluations of teaching. Our results suggest that a higher fWHR is associated with a better evaluation for male faculty, while the opposite is the case for females. These results are not due to differences in teachers’ productivity. Because teacher evaluations are relevant for pay and promotion, this might contribute to the underrepresentation of women in economics.We thank Osea Giuntella, Ana Nuevo-Chiquero and Esteban Puentes for their helpful comments. Funding: This work was supported by Fondecyt Inicio [Project 11170968], and the Centre for Social Conflict and Cohesion Studies (COES) [CONICYT/FONDAP/15130009]. Correspondence should be addressed to Valentina Paredes, Department of Economics, University of Chile, Diagonal Paraguay 257, Santiago, Chil