Instituições e a informalidade no mercado de trabalho

This paper aims to develop a model capable of reconciling some of the main institutional aspects relative to labor market informality. It is a two-sector, formal and informal, matching model that incorporates the main tradeoffs faced by workers and firms when deciding in which sector they will operate. The model presents an innovation that makes it more coherent with most stylized facts and recent empirical evidence. Policy simulation's results show that increasing unemployment benefits and reducing payroll taxes generate positive, although small effects over labor market indicators. However, intensifying government audition rates implies a substantial reduction of informality rates, but it also causes unemployment to increase and the deterioration of other important indicators in the Brazilian labor market.O objetivo deste artigo é desenvolver um modelo que concilie os principais aspectos institucionais relativos à informalidade no mercado de trabalho. Trata-se de um modelo de matching com dois setores, formal e informal, que incorpora os principais tradeoffs que firmas e trabalhadores enfrentam ao decidir em que setor ingressar. O modelo apresenta uma inovação que o torna mais coerente aos principais fatos estilizados e às evidências empíricas mais recentes. Os resultados das simulações de políticas mostram que elevações no seguro-desemprego e reduções no imposto sobre a folha geram impactos positivos, porém reduzidos, sobre os principais indicadores do mercado de trabalho. Ao contrário, uma intensificação da fiscalização governamental leva a significativas reduções da informalidade, mas também provoca uma elevação substancial da taxa de desemprego e uma piora em outros indicadores do mercado de trabalho brasileiro

IMPOSTO SOBRE TRABALHO E SEU IMPACTO NOS MERCADOS DE TRABALHO FORMAL E INFORMAL

This paper aims to analyze the effects of payroll taxes on the determination of the degree of informality and the main indicators of the Brazilian labor market, considering both aggregate and disaggregate indicators by qualification level. For that purpose, a two- sector model is developed, where firms of both sectors use qualified and non-qualified workers as inputs for production. The demand for labor is determined by workers' productivity while the supply side is represented by wage curves, which are specific to each sector and qualification group. The results show that reducing payroll taxes has a significant effect over the formality degree and increases both employment level and earnings.

The evolving impacts of COVID-19 on small businesses since the CARES Act

This note provides new evidence on how small business owners have been impacted by COVID-19, and how these effects have evolved since the passage of the CARES Act. As part of a broader and ongoing project, we collected survey data from more than 8,000 small business owners in the U.S. from March 28th, one day after the CARES Act was passed, through April 20th. The data include information on firm size, layoffs, beliefs about the future prospects of their businesses, as well as awareness of existing government relief programs. We provide three main findings. First, by the time the CARES Act was passed, surveyed small business owners were already severely impacted by COVID-19-related disruptions: 60% had already laid off at least one worker. Second, business owners’ expectations about the future are negative and have deteriorated throughout our study period, with 37% of respondents in the first week reporting that they did not expect to recover within 2 years, growing to 46% by the last week. Third, the smallest businesses had the least awareness of government assistance programs, the slowest growth in awareness after the passage of the CARES Act, and never caught up with larger businesses. The last finding indicates that small businesses may have missed out on initial Paycheck Protection Program funds because of low baseline awareness and differential access to information relative to larger firms

SISTEMA BRASILEIRO DE FINANCIAMENTO À EDUCAÇÃO BÁSICA: PRINCIPAIS CARACTERÍSTICAS, LIMITAÇÕES E ALTERNATIVAS

Education is fundamental for social and economic development and school finance is one of the main features of an educational system. Assuming that a greater amount of resources brings more school quality, one can say that an "appropriate" primary and secondary school finance system should guarantee: (i) a satisfactory level of resources per pupil in each educational level; and (ii) equal opportunities for all students. This paper aims to analyze in what extent the actual system, particularly the Fundef, it is well succeeded in accomplishing these objectives, determining its main characteristics and limitations. The results suggest that although Fundef promoted a better resource distribution in the northern and northeastern regions, when considering the whole country the final result is negative. Besides that, when projecting future enrolment, two out of three scenarios indicate that Fundef distortions are worsened. Considering that, we also analyze the possible impacts of school finance centralization, including redistributive impacts among state, state's capital and other municipalities.

Economic Shocks and Crime: Evidence from the Brazilian Trade Liberalization

This paper studies the effect of changes in economic conditions on crime. We exploit the 1990s trade liberalization in Brazil as a natural experiment generating exogenous shocks to local economies. We document that regions exposed to larger tariff reductions experienced a temporary increase in crime following liberalization. Next, we investigate through what channels the trade-induced economic shocks may have affected crime. We show that the shocks had significant effects on potential determinants of crime, such as labor market conditions, public goods provision, and income inequality. We propose a novel framework exploiting the distinct dynamic responses of these variables to obtain bounds on the effect of labor market conditions on crime. Our results indicate that this channel accounts for 75 to 93 percent of the effect of the trade-induced shocks on crime

Economic Shocks and Crime: Evidence from the Brazilian Trade Liberalization

This paper studies the effect of changes in economic conditions on crime. We exploit the 1990s trade liberalization in Brazil as a natural experiment generating exogenous shocks to local economies. We document that regions exposed to larger tariff reductions experienced a temporary increase in crime following liberalization. Next, we investigate through what channels the trade-induced economic shocks may have affected crime. We show that the shocks had significant effects on potential determinants of crime, such as labor market conditions, public goods provision, and income inequality. We propose a novel framework exploiting the distinct dynamic responses of these variables to obtain bounds on the effect of labor market conditions on crime. Our results indicate that this channel accounts for 75 to 93 percent of the effect of the trade-induced shocks on crime

Firms and inequality in Latin America

The relationship between firms and inequality has been a focus of recent attention globally. This chapter summarizes basic facts about this relationship for Latin America. Unlike advanced economies where superstar firm growth has prompted concerns over disproportionate income growth at the top, the facts we summarize illustrate that the main concern for Latin America is the extreme prevalence of tiny businesses whose workers and owners tend to populate the bottom income segments. The empirical likelihood that these businesses improve their productivity and grow to hire more workers and pay better wages is also very low. The region displays a deficit of employment generation in SMEs, by contrast to both microbusinesses (including self-employment) and large corporations. While the former tend to remunerate both workers and owners with very low incomes, the latter pay high wages but also exhibit low labor shares

Trade and Informality in the Presence of Labor Market Frictions and Regulations

We build an equilibrium model of a small open economy with labor market frictions and imperfectly enforced regulations. Heterogeneous firms sort into the formal or informal sector. We estimate the model using data from Brazil, and use counterfactual simulations to understand how trade affects economic outcomes in the presence of informality. We show the following: 1) Trade openness unambiguously decreases informality in the tradable sector but has ambiguous effects on aggregate informality. 2) The productivity gains from trade are understated when the informal sector is omitted. 3) Trade openness results in large welfare gains even when informality is repressed. 4) Repressing informality increases productivity but at the expense of employment and welfare. 5) The effects of trade on wage inequality are reversed when the informal sector is incorporated in the analysis. 6) The informal sector works as an “unemployment buffer” but not a “welfare buffer” in the event of negative economic shocks

Uma análise do perfil e da dinâmica das empresas que usam o Cartão BNDES

Bibliografia: p. 30The BNDES Card is a credit line designed specifically to finance the acquisition of goods and services by Brazilian micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSME). Based on the idea of a regular credit card, the line experimented fast growth in its use during 2006-2012. This study uses firm-level data on labor market outcomes from Rais and on exports from Secex, both administrative databases from the Ministry of Economy, to descriptively analyze the characteristics of firms that used the card compared to those that did not for the 2006-2012 period. It also uses a Fixed-Effect Event Study approach to analyze the dynamics of firms before and after the use of the card in order to describe selection patterns to the credit line. The estimates indicate that firms supported by BNDES show different trends before and after treatment and that those differences are not constant over time (even in the pre-treatment period). Such evidence raises questions about the validity of the common trend assumptions in studies that employed a Difference-in-Differences approach to estimate BNDES Card’s effects, suggesting the need for more robust and causal evidence.O Cartão BNDES é uma linha de crédito, do tipo pré-aprovada, voltada para o financiamento da aquisição de bens e serviços por micro, pequenas e médias empresas (MPME), cujo uso se expandiu intensamente entre 2006 e 2012. Dados da Relação Anual de Informações Sociais (Rais) e da Secretaria de Comércio Exterior (Secex) revelam diferenças no perfil das empresas que usam o Cartão BNDES em comparação às demais. Para analisar a dinâmica das empresas que usam o produto, são estimados modelos de estudo de evento, que incluem efeito fixo de firma. As estimativas obtidas sugerem um padrão de seleção nas empresas que usam o Cartão BNDES: elas apresentam desempenho diferente das demais, mesmo antes do primeiro uso, e essa diferença de desempenho não parece ser constante ao longo do tempo. Esses resultados colocam em xeque o emprego do método de diferenças em diferenças e apontam a necessidade de outros métodos para a identificação do impacto do Cartão BNDES

Texto para discussão 5: Sistema brasileiro de financiamento à educação básica: principais características, limitações e alternativas

A importância da educação no desenvolvimento sócio-econômico de um país é inquestionável e um dos aspectos fundamentais de um sistema de educação é exatamente a sua estrutura de financiamento. Partindo do pressuposto que um maior o volume de recursos garante uma maior qualidade do ensino, um sistema “adequado” de financiamento à educação básica deveria procurar atender a dois objetivos centrais: (i) garantir um nível satisfatório de recursos aluno/ano para cada etapa de ensino; e (ii) assegurar a igualdade de oportunidades a todos os alunos por meio de uma distribuição equânime dos recursos. O objetivo deste trabalho é determinar as principais características e limitações do atual sistema, bem como analisar em que medida ele é bem sucedido em atender a estas metas, dando especial ênfase à análise do Fundef. Os resultados obtidos sugerem que, embora o Fundef tenha representado uma melhora na distribuição dos recursos dos estados das regiões norte e nordeste, quando se considera o país como um todo o resultado líquido é negativo. Além disso, ao projetar as matrículas no tempo, dois dos três cenários considerados indicam um agravamento da distorção introduzida pelo Fundef. Diante disso, analisamos quais seriam os impactos da criação de um sistema de financiamento à educação básica completamente centralizado, incluindo os possíveis impactos redistributivos entre governo estadual, capital e demais municípios, no âmbito de cada estado.Número de páginas: 23 p.Políticas EconômicasPolíticas SociaisA série Texto para Discussão tem como objetivo divulgar resultados de trabalhos desenvolvidos pela área de pesquisa da Diretoria de Educação da Escola de Administração Fazendária, bem como outros trabalhos considerados de relevância tendo em vista as linhas de pesquisa da Instituição