La présente thèse se propose d'étudier la formation de la demande pour les instruments de paiements. Dans un premier essai, nous montrons à l'aide d'un modèle théorique et d'une étude empirique sur données françaises que la tarification des retraits déplacés réduit la demande pour les espèces. Dans un deuxième essai, nous montrons, également à l'aide d'un modèle théorique et d'une étude sur données françaises, que les marchands ajustent leur prix pour rendre les paiements en espèce plus pratiques, au sens où ils mobilisent moins de pièces et billets. Les prix convénients à payer en espèces sont plus fréquent toutes choses égales par ailleurs, et ils sont plus fréquemment payés en espèces. Les troisième et quatrième essais étudient l'impact du crime comme facteur environnemental pour les marchands, plus spécifiquement sur le niveau d'appréciation des espèces et sur l'acceptation de la carte bancaire. Nous montrons que les marchands ont une préférence plus élevée pour les espèces et acceptent moins fréquemment les cartes bancaire de paiement dans un département où la criminalité financière est importante. Les consommateurs possèdent plus souvent une carte bancaire et retirent hebdomadairement des sommes plus élevées aux distributeurs automatiques de billets. Nous mettons en évidence les effets opposés pour un niveau élevé de criminalité violente, aussi bien pour les consommateurs que pour les marchands.% Les effets de la criminalité financière sont interprétés comme résultant de sélection adverse tandis que les effets de la criminalité violente sont interprétés comme des effets de précaution.Enfin, le sixième essai étudie l'influence du risque perçu sur la fréquence de détention et la fréquence d'utilisation des instruments de paiement. Nous appliquons le modèle de Jacoby et Kaplan (1972) au choix de l'instrument de paiement, et nous concluons à partir d'une étude empirique sur données françaises que le risque de manque et le risque de temps ont les effets les plus transversaux sur la demande pour les instruments de paiement. / The present dissertation studies the formation of the demand for the main retail payment instruments (cash, bank card and check). The first chapter presents both a theoretical and empirical analysis using French data. We conclude that charging cash withdrawals at ATMs outside the network of the bank reduces the global demand for cash. The second chapter concludes, with the help of a theoretical model and on the basis of French data, that a seller adjust prices in order to make the buyers pay cash by making cash payment more convenient, in the sense that they limit the number of coins and notes exchanged. All other things being equal, we show that convenient prices are more frequent and more frequently paid cash. The third and fourth chapters study the impact of crime as an environmental factor on the merchant side, more specifically on the preference for cash and card acceptance. We show that in an environment with a high level of financial criminality, merchants have a higher preference for cash and are less likely to accept bank cards. The fifth chapter studies the impact of crime as an environmental factor on the choice of payment instrument by consumers. They are more likely to own a payment card, and the weekly sums withdrawn at ATMs are higher. We find opposite effects for Violent Crime. Eventually, the sixth chapter studies the impact of perceived risk on the holding and and use of payment instruments. We apply the model of Jacoby and Kaplan (1972) to payment instruments, and we conclude on the basis of an empirical investigation that the risk of lack and the time risk have the most cross-cutting effects on the demand for each of the main retail payment instruments.

In this dissertation I study the labor market behavior of sciences and engineering (S&E) doctorates trained and employed in the US. The first essay is an empirical study of task-to-task transitions based on the Survey of Doctorate Recipients (1973-2001). It first assesses the relevance of the careers of doctorates to S&E in general, and research and development (R&D) in particular. Second, it evaluates the participation rates and mobility patterns of doctorates in careers of different types using a transition model with independent competing risks. The second essay extends the empirical framework described above and specifies a dynamic model of occupational choices with symmetric learning about one of the task- specific abilities and dependence on past performance to explain the empirical career patterns described in the first essay. The predictions of the model are used to evaluate the effects of two counterfactual experiments on the supply of research skill. The third essay studies geographic choices for first employment of doctorates using the Survey of Earned Doctorates (SED) 1957-2005. Decisions of Americans, Canadians, and third country nationals to stay in the US after their PhD versus moving to Canada are compared. Individual characteristics and differences in political and economic conditions and career opportunities in the US versus Canada are evaluated to explain the observed differences in the choice of location. / Thesis (Ph.D, Economics) -- Queen's University, 2009-08-31 11:33:27.809

Dans la littérature économique, on remarque que l’agglomération spatiale joue un rôle clé dans la croissance économique. Il a récemment été reconnu que les conditions de développement des pays peuvent modifier la relation entre l’agglomération géographique et la croissance. Cette thèse vise à analyser les effets de l’agglomération dans les pays d’Amérique latine.Tout d’abord, nous allons examiner l’impact de l’agglomération sur la croissance des régions latino-américaines et nous analysons le rôle du niveau de développement dans cette relation. Afin de répondre à ces questions, un modèle de croissance est estimé compte tenu de l’interdépendance spatiale. Les résultats montrent que les régions d’Amérique Latine bénéficient des effets croissants d’agglomération géographique jusqu’à un certain niveau de revenu. Ensuite, nous allons étudier l’influence de la nature des externalités d’agglomération sur la productivité sectorielle en regardant le cas de l’ Equateur. Un modèle économétrique qui traite de facteurs endogènes potentiels est estimé. Les résultats indiquent que les externalités de diversité génèrent les effets les plus élevés sur la productivité. Enfin, nous analyserons la façon dont la concentration spatiale au sein des régions est influencée par le commerce extérieur. Un modèle de panel de données est estimé en tenant compte des particularités régionales, des effets temporels et des tendances temporelles des régions colombiennes. Les résultats montrent que l’effet de l’ouverture commerciale sur la concentration spatiale au sein des régions est renforcée par deux aspects : le fait d’avoir un grand marché et le fait d’avoir une localisation géographique favorable par rapport au accès au marché international. / In economic literature, it has been underscored that spatial agglomeration plays a keyrole in the economic growth. Recently, it has been acknowledged that the conditions of development of countries are likely to shape the agglomeration-growth relationship.On these grounds, this PhD thesis aims to analyze the effects of agglomeration in Latin American countries.First, it investigates whether Latin American countries experience positive effects ofagglomeration on growth and to what extent their level of development influences such effects. In order to answer these questions, a growth model using regional data is estimated considering spatial interdependence. The results show that Latin American regions enjoy increasing positive effects of agglomeration on their growth until a certain level of income is reached.Second, it studies the influence of the nature of agglomeration externalities, such as specialization, diversity, density and competition on industrial productivity in cantonsby looking at the case of Ecuador. Using Generalized Method of Moments, an econometric model dealing with potential endogenous factors is estimated. The results indicate that diversity externalities generate the highest positive effects of agglomeration on productivity.Finally, it addresses how spatial agglomeration within regions is shaped by external trade. A panel data model is estimated taking into account regional characteristics,time-specific effects and regional-specific time trends of Colombian regions. The results show that the effect of trade openness in spatial concentration within regions isenhanced by two aspects: the home market effect and the location advantage effect of main cities within regions.

Identifying the complex channels through which civil war affects household decisions is important in the design of policies that eliminate or mitigate the consequences of armed conflict on household welfare. This is particularly relevant in conflict-affected countries looking to establish a transitory justice towards a post-conflict. In this dissertation, I analyze the micro-level impact of civil war and illicit activities on household welfare, using the case of Colombia and Burundi. For doing this, I develop five chapters where I provide an empirical investigation on three dimensions: (i) the impact of armed conflict on agricultural production; (ii) the role of institutions on the “war of drugs”; and, (iii) the determinants and socio-economics consequences of household migration during and after being exposed to civil war.The first part investigates the impact of armed conflict on the agricultural production, using the case of coffee growers in Colombia. After being many years out of conflict, coffee producer regions in Colombia were exposed to violence as a consequence of the intensification of conflict during nineties and the deteriorate of the world coffee market. In order to initially understand such relationship, in Chapter 1, co-authored with Ana María Ibañez and Philip Verwimp, we use unique census data sets from two different years (1997 and 2005) to estimate the relationship between coffee and violence. First, we explore how conflict generates disincentives to continue on agricultural production. Second, we examine the direct impact of conflict on agricultural production through different productive outcomes. We find a significant negative relationship between levels of violence and the decision to continue coffee production as well as the levels of productivity of the coffee production to coffee. Results are robust after controlling for sample selection bias and alternative specifications.After establishing observational evidence from the census analysis on the presumably negative impact of armed conflict on the agricultural production, I make a step further to establish a causal link in Chapter 2. I take advantage of a natural experiment in the levels of violence due to the unexpected rupture of the peace dialogues between Colombian Government and guerillas groups in 2002. Using data provided by National Federation of Coffee Growers of Colombia, I estimate the Intention to Treat (ITT) effect using a difference-in-difference specification. Results suggest that an exogenous increase of the levels of violence induced a reduction of hectares allocated to coffee, on average, -0.06 hectares (ha). Moreover, an average farm, which is 2 ha of coffee, an exogenous increase of the levels of violence induced a reduction of the sowing new coffee until 3.5%. This paper contributes to the literature on the microeconomics costs of conflict in Agricultural Production, providing further information about mechanisms (labor market).In long civil conflicts, rebel groups may eventually be evolved in production of illicit crops to finance their activities, boosting the intensity and prevalence of armed confrontations. Despite the different multi-lateral drug policies, the production continues increasing. In the second part of the dissertation I study this fact using the case of coca crops in Colombia. In Chapter 3, co-authored with Santiago Tobon and Jesse D’Anjou, we analyze the role of formalization of land property rights in the war against illicit crops in Colombia. We exploit an exogenous variation in the level of formalization of land property rights, as result of the application of a national land-titling program during 1994-2000. We argue that, as a consequence of the increase of state presence and visibility during the period of 2000-2009, municipalities with a higher level of formalization of their land property rights saw a greater reduction in the area allocated to illicit crops. We found a significant negative relationship between the level of formalization of land property rights and the number of hectares allocated to coca crops per municipality. We hypothesize that this is due to the increased cost of growing illicit crops on formal land compared to informal, and due to the possibility of obtaining more benefits in the newly installed institutional environment when land is formalized. Empirical results validate these two mechanisms. The third and last part of this dissertation, studies the nutritional status of formerly displaced households after return and the determinants of household structure during civil war in Burundi. In chapter 4, co-authored with Philip Verwimp, we investigate the food security and nutritional status of formerly displaced households. Using the 2006 Core Welfare Indicator Survey for Burundi we compare their food intake and their level of expenses with that of their non-displaced neighbors. We test whether it is the duration of displacement that matters for current food security and nutritional status or the time lapsed since returning. We use log-linear as well as propensity score matching and an IV-approach to control for self-selection bias. We find that the individuals and households who returned home just before the time of the survey are worse off compared to those who returned several years earlier. On average, the formerly displaced have 5% lower food expenses and 6% lower calorie intake. Moreover, we found evidence in favor of duration of displacement as the main mechanisms through which displacement affect household welfare Results are robust after controlling by self-selection bias. Despite international, government and NGO assistance, the welfare of recent returnees is lagging seriously behind in comparison with the local non-displaced populations.The final chapter, co-authored with Richard Akresh and Philip Verwimp, analyzes whether civil war modifies household structure by boosting individual migration. The identification strategy uses a unique two waves longitudinal data set from Burundi, for 1997 and 2008. This data set was collected during ongoing conflict and allows tracking individual migration decision over ten years. Besides the traditional conflict exposure measures at village level, our data gathered yearly information on household victimization. Results show that higher exposure to violence increases the probability to individual non-marital migration. These effects are concentrated on poor households and those household members that are adults or men. Our results are consistent with aggregated measure of conflict exposure, as well as household level victimization measures. Furthermore, we found that whereas marital migration in adult un-married women is unrelated with exposure to violence at village level, it does with household victimization approaches. In particular, we found that being victim of any assets related losses is related to an increase of marital migration for middle age unmarried women. It could imply the use of marriage market as strategy to face liquidity constraints. Results are robust to including province–specific time trends, alternative conflict exposure measures, and different levels of aggregation. / Doctorat en Sciences économiques et de gestion / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

This dissertation analyzes both the economics of the defense contracting process and the impact of total dollar obligations on the economies of U.S. states. Using various econometric techniques, I will estimate relationships across individual contracts, state level output, and income inequality. I will achieve this primarily through the use of a dataset on individual contract obligations. The first essay will catalog the distribution of contracts and isolate aspects of the process that contribute to contract dollar obligations. Accordingly, this study describes several characteristics about individual defense contracts, from 1966-2006: (i) the distribution of contract dollar obligations is extremely rightward skewed, (ii) contracts are unevenly distributed in a geographic sense across the United States, (iii) increased duration of a contract by 10 percent is associated with an increase in costs by 4 percent, (iv) competition does not seem to affect dollar obligations in a substantial way, (v) contract pre-payment financing increases the obligation of contracts from anywhere from 62 to 380 percent over non-financed contracts. The second essay will turn to an aggregate focus, and look the impact of defense spending on state economic output. The analysis in chapter two attempts to estimate the state level fiscal multiplier, deploying Difference-in-Differences estimation as an attempt to filter out potential endogeneity bias. Interstate variation in procurement spending facilitates utilization of a natural experiment scenario, focusing on the spike in relative spending in 1982. The state level relative multiplier estimate here is 1.19, and captures the short run, impact effect of the 1982 spending spike. Finally I will look at the relationship between defense contracting and income inequality. Military spending has typically been observed to have a negative relationship with income inequality. The third chapter examines the existence of this relationship, combining data on defense procurement with data on income inequality at the state level, in a longitudinal analysis across the United States. While the estimates do not suggest a significant relationship exists for the income share of the top ten percent of households, there is a significant positive relationship for the income share of top one percent households for an increase in defense procurement.

Cette thèse est composée de quatre essais relatifs à l'impact des choix organisationnels sur la performance dans les réseaux de franchise. Conçue comme une contribution à l'économie managériale, la thèse est fondée sur les théories de l'organisation industrielle, et met en oeuvre des techniques d'économétrie appliquée pour aborder des problématiques ayant des implications managériales.La première partie de la thèse porte sur les structures organisationnelles des réseaux de franchise, et sur leur impact en termes de perfomance. Plus précisément, le Chapitre 2 étudie l'impact d'une série de choix organisationnels de l'entreprise amont (le franchiseur). Le Chapitre 3 s'intéresse àJ'influence de l'introduction de franchisées multi·unités dans le réseau.La deuxième partie de la thèse porte sur les choix contractuels, plus précisément sur les liens entre le taux de redevance et la perfomance des réseaux de franchise. Ainsi, le Chapitre 4 étudie l'influence des problèmes d'incitation sur la définition du taux de redevance, et les implications sur la performance financière du réseau. Alors que les travaux antérieurs dans la littérature empirique ont révélé l'inadaptation de la théorie du signal pour comprendre les choix contractuels des réseaux de franchise dans les pays développés, le Chapitre 5 porte l'analyse sur un pays émergent, le Brésil, et montre que la déternination du taux de redevance est influencée par une motivation de signal liée à la perfomance future du réseau.L'introduction générale, Chapitre 1, met en évidence l'intérêt de travailler sur les réseaux de franchise et présente les objectifs et les orientations de la thèse. Une conclusion générale est proposée en Chapitre 6. / This dissertation is composed of four essays dealing with the impact of organizational choices on franchised network performance.The dissertation, conceived as a contribution to managerial economics, is based on the theories of industrial organization and implements applied econometric tools to address issues with managerial implications.The first part of the dissertation focuses on the governance structures and their impact on network performance. Chapter 2 studies the influence of the upstream organizational choices on network performance and Chapter 3 deals with the impact of multi-unit franchising on network perfonnance.The second part of the dissertation addresses the relationship between the royalty rate and the franchised network perfonnance. Chapter 4 studies the influence on the royalty rate of incentive motivations and risk issues at the downstream leve!, in addition to the impact of the royalty rate on network perfonnance. Chapter 5 deals with the effect of signaling motivations on the royalty rate regarding new Brazilian franchisors with a high value business concept.As a general introduction, Chapter 1 discusses the interest in studying franchising and outlines the focus of the dissertation.The final chapter, Chapter 6, concludes the dissertation and identifies future research directions.

<div>This dissertation consists of three chapters regarding labor economics. The first chapter studies the relative preference men and women have for working with coworkers of the same or opposite sex. The second chapter develops a conceptual framework for estimating the distribution of perceived returns to investments conditional on observed characteristics. The third chapter applies the methods described in the second chapter to estimate perceived returns to college and discusses policy implications.</div><div><br></div><div>The first chapter analyzes the effect of occupational gender composition on job-specific labor supply for workers of each gender. I construct a static model of job selection wherein preferences regarding coworker gender composition produce gender-specific compensating differentials. I estimate the model to identify the underlying coworker gender preference parameters. Based on estimated compensating differentials, men's preference is highest for occupations that are 60% female and lowest for female-dominated occupations. Women prefer jobs that are female-dominated, and are least satisfied with jobs that are 25% male all else equal.</div><div><br></div><div>The second chapter describes a conceptual framework for inferring agents' perceived returns to college by exploiting the dollar-for-dollar relationship between perceived returns and tuition costs in a binary choice model of college attendance. This approach has four attractive features. First, it provides estimates of perceived returns in terms of compensating variation, which directly inform financial policies that seek to (dis)incentivize the investment. Second, it provides very fine continuously-heterogeneous estimates conditional on a large set of observed characteristics, allowing for differential predictions for how selective, well-publicized policies are likely to affect different types of individuals. Third, because it obtains type-specific perceived returns distributions instead of point elasticities, it provides differential predictions for the effects of type-specific financial interventions depending on the magnitude of the intervention. Finally, the estimates are obtained assuming rational expectations only on prices (one component of returns) rather than on returns as a whole.</div><div><br></div><div>The third chapter applies the method described in the second chapter to estimate perceived returns to college using NLSY79 data. Estimating the model using both maximum likelihood and moment inequalities, I find that the scale of the distribution of perceived returns is an order of magnitude lower than past work has found when assuming rational expectations on income returns. The low variance I find in perceived returns implies high responses to financial aid. I predict a 2.6 percentage point increase in college attendance from a $1,000 universal annual tuition subsidy, which is consistent with quasi-experimental estimates of the effects of tuition assistance on college attendance. Adapting the difference-in-difference estimation performed by Dynarski (2003) on the effect of the Social Security Student Benefit to the current setting, I find that the policy increased perceived returns to college by $23,800, compared to an average aid amount of $6,700 per year ($26,800 per four years) (year 2000 dollars). Using the estimated distribution of perceived returns, I perform a counterfactual policy experiment that induces a set percentage of the population to attend college at minimal cost to the government.</div>

Cette thèse examine l'impact des institutions sur le comportement des travailleurs et la qualité de l'emploi. Les deux premiers chapitres utilisent des données subjectives afin d’évaluer l'impact des politiques de l'emploi sur la qualité de l'emploi d'une manière qui prenne en compte un éventail plus large de conditions de travail pertinentes par rapport à la littérature existante. Le premier chapitre montre qu'une baisse de l'assurance-chômage diminue la satisfaction au travail des travailleurs en les amenant à accepter de moins bonnes conditions de travail. Le deuxième chapitre montre que les effets de la protection partielle de l'emploi sur les licenciements améliorent le sentiment de sécurité de l'emploi pour les travailleurs protégés, mais au prix d'externalités négatives pour les autres travailleurs. Le troisième chapitre apporte de nouveaux éléments sur la manière dont les institutions affectent les normes de genre en examinant les comportements des femmes sur le marché du travail et au sein de leur couple. En nous appuyant sur la période de 41 ans de division de l'Allemagne, nous montrons que les institutions de la RDA, favorable à l'égalité des sexes, ont créé une culture qui a défait la norme selon laquelle l’homme est le principal pourvoyeur du ménage. En revanche, cette norme est encore très répandue en ex-Allemagne de l’Ouest. / This dissertation examines the impact of institutions on workers' behavior and job quality. The first two chapters use subjective data to assess the impact of employment policies on job quality in a way that takes into account a broader range of relevant working conditions compared to existing papers. The first chapter shows that lower unemployment insurance decreases workers' job satisfaction by making them accept lower working conditions. The second chapter shows that the effects of partial employment protection on layoffs improve the feeling of job security for protected workers, but at the cost of a negative externality on other workers. The third chapter provides new evidence on the way institutions affect gender norms by looking at women's behaviors on the labour market and inside their couple. Using the 41-year division of Germany, we show that GDR’s gender equal institutions have created a culture that has undone the male breadwinner norm. By contrast, this norm is still prevalent in former West Germany.

We examine the gender gap in school attendance of children aged 7-14 in India using National Family Health Survey Three (NFHS-3). We demonstrate that the choice of the sample examined has important implications for policy. A household decision model is used to motivate whether a child attends school and/or works. A bivariate probit model and Blinder-Oaxaca Decomposition are applied to see how changing sample groups and adding regressors impact results, and the implications this has upon gender gap and effectiveness of centralized policy as opposed to decentralized policy. Results show the gender gap is sensitive to the sub samples chosen (e.g. a particular state, a specific location (urban or rural), and gender) and to the choice of regressors, and that centralized policy may be less effective than decentralized policy. Parental education, wealth, location and gender are found to be the most volatile and influential variables in the household decision process. / Graduate

Submitted by Fabio Sobreira Campos da Costa (fabio.sobreira@ufpe.br) on 2017-05-05T13:43:34Z No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) tese_rcaldas.pdf: 1768887 bytes, checksum: e255530bb7c37a948996859082040aac (MD5) / Made available in DSpace on 2017-05-05T13:43:34Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 2 license_rdf: 1232 bytes, checksum: 66e71c371cc565284e70f40736c94386 (MD5) tese_rcaldas.pdf: 1768887 bytes, checksum: e255530bb7c37a948996859082040aac (MD5) Previous issue date: 2016-05-16 / CNPQ / This dissertation evaluates three different public policies implemented in Brazil with the main objective of reducing regional inequalities and improving life conditions of the poorest region of the country, the Northeast. In the first chapter, I analyze the impact of the Constitutional Financing Program (FNE) on income and employment at municipality level. Data are from the Brazilian demographic censuses and FNE dataset, provided by the Bank of Northeast, for 2000 and 2010. There is a discussion about the inclusion of new municipalities in semi arid delimitation in Brazil. The main argument is that these municipalities would benefit from the FNE, which has better benefits for those inside semi arid area, such as smaller interest rates and longer financing terms and limits. Using difference-in-differences estimation, I analyze the relationship of microcredit program on income or employment, using the Census 2000 as the baseline and the Census 2010 as the post-treatment period. I do not find a relationship of microcredit program on income or employment, and one possible reason for this is the fact that new municipalities are not taking more funding from FNE. The second chapter evaluates the effectiveness of a public irrigation project implemented in Litoral do Camocim e Acaraú micro-region, at Ceará state, in the Northeast region of Brazil. The dataset is based on individual Censuses data of 2000 and 2010, capturing pre and post period of an irrigation project’s implementation in the region, which happened in 2001. Although the literature points to a positive relationship between irrigation and income, I find, in general, a negative and significant impact of irrigation on main wages, total wages and productivity. One of the reasons for this unexpected result is that workers may switch to agricultural sector and become family farmers, who produce for their own consumption. In this way, even though they do not have higher wages, they may be better off in terms of consumption and nutrition. When analyzing the impact on specific products produced at Baixo Acaraú irrigated area, the coefficients are positive and significant at 1%. Finally, the third and last chapter analyzes the impact of intergovernmental transfers on inter and intra-regional inequalities in Brazil. Taking advantage of the discontinuities of the Municipalities Participation Fund (FPM) – an important intergovernmental transfer – this paper uses a regression discontinuity design to identify the causal impact of FPM transfers on regional economic growth rates. I find that an increase in FPM transfer impacts positively on economic growth rate of the poorest region of the country (Northeast) and has no significant impact on the richest region (Southeast), which indicates a decrease in the inter-regional inequality. Nonetheless, I find that the improvements on growth rates achieved by the Brazilian Northeast are driven by the richest municipalities. These results suggest that even though intergovernmental transfers help poor regions catching up intra regional inequalities may increase. / Esta tese avalia três diferentes políticas públicas implementadas no Brasil com o principal objetivo de reduzir as desigualdades regionais e melhorar as condições de vida e indicadores socioeconômicos da região mais pobre do país, o Nordeste. O primeiro capítulo analisa os impactos do Fundo Constitucional de Financiamento do Nordeste (FNE) sobre renda e emprego a nível municipal. A base de dados foi obtida em parte dos Censos Demográficos, fornecidos pelo Instituto Brasileiro de Geografia e Estatística, e em parte do Banco do Nordeste, para os anos de 2000 e 2010. Existe uma discussão na literatura sobre a inclusão de novos municípios na região do semiárido brasileiro, após a mudança nos seus critérios de elegibilidade. O principal argumento é que esses novos municípios do semiárido beneficiar-se-iam mais do FNE do que antes, uma vez que municípios do semiárido possuem benefícios extras como menores taxas de juros e maiores prazos de financiamentos. Utilizando o método diferença-em-diferenças, não foram encontrados efeitos do programa de microcrédito sobre renda ou emprego dos municípios tratados. Uma possível explicação para isto é o fato de os novos municípios não aproveitarem dos benefícios extras e não pegarem mais empréstimos pelo programa. O segundo capítulo avalia a eficiência dos projetos públicos de irrigação instalados pelas agências de desenvolvimento na região Nordeste desde a década de 1970. Foi utilizado o caso do Projeto Baixo Acaraú, localizados na microrregião do Litoral do Camocim e Acaraú, no estado do Ceará. A base de dados utiliza informações individuais obtidas nos Censos Demográficos de 2000 e 2010, capturando os períodos pré e pós-tratamento, dado que o projeto de irrigação teve sua primeira etapa concluída em 2001. Embora a literatura aponte para uma relação positiva entre irrigação e renda, este artigo encontra, em geral, um impacto negativo e significante sobre o salário principal, todos os salários e a produtividade. Uma das razões para este resultado inesperado é que trabalhadores podem ter passado a trabalhar no setor agrícola após a implementação do perímetro irrigado, e terem se tornado produtores familiares, que produzem para o auto-consumo. Desta forma, embora eles não tenham tido impacto positivo sobre sua renda, eles podem estar melhores em termos de consumo e nutrição. Quando analisado o impacto sobre produtos específicos produzidos na área irrigada do Baixo Acaraú, os coeficientes são positivos e significantes a 1%. Por fim, o terceiro e último capítulo analisa o impacto das transferências intergovernamentais sobre as desigualdades inter e intra regionais no Brasil. Aproveitando-se das descontinuidades no repasse do Fundo de Participação dos Municípios (FPM), este artigo utiliza o método de regressão descontínua para identificar o impacto causal das tranferências do FPM sobre a taxa de crescimento econômico dos municípios brasileiros. Foram utilizados dados das transferências do ano de 2010 e a taxa de crescimento econômico foi calculada entre os anos 2011 e 2013, baseado em dados obtidos no Ipeadata. Dentre os resultados, identificou-se que um aumento nas transferências do FPM impacta positivamente no crescimento econômico na região mais pobre do país (Nordeste) e que não tem impacto sobre a região mais rica (Sudeste), o que sugere uma diminuição na desigualdade inter regional do Brasil, que é uma das mais elevadas do mundo. No entanto, as melhorias no crescimento econômico na região Nordeste foram guiadas pelos municípios mais ricos. Este resultado sugere que, embora as tranferências intergovernamentais ajudem as regiões pobres a crescerem, a desigualdade inter-regional deve aumentar.