In this paper I study how the repeal of the Swedish wealth tax (1 of January 2007) has affected people´s labour supply behaviour. This particular issue is relevant because it may help us understand some of the effects of the earnings tax changes that have taken place in Sweden. Accoring to standard economic theory a repealed wealth tax is similar to an income effect for the persons who previously paid the tax. That means that they theoretically will want to consume more leisure, that is decrease their labour supply. The method I am using to test this hypothesis is a difference-in-difference approach where the treatment group consists of persons who previously paid the tax and the control group of comparable persons who did not pay the tax. The data I am using is taken from a Swedish database called LINDA, compiled by the Swedish Central Agency for Statistics (SCB). My main result in this paper is that the repealed wealth tax does not seem to have had any influnece on the labour supply behavior of the persons who previously paid the tax.

Using data from the Labour Force Survey conducted by Statistics South Africa twice yearly this thesis intend to evaluate the Expanded Public Works Programme regarding its effectiveness in creating employment and raising income in households with participating individuals. The South African labour market is well known for its high rates of unemployment and also its segregation, primarily between black and white people, but also young people are having a hard time finding jobs. In order to fight these problems the South African government has launched the Expanded Public Works Programme(EPWP) which provides low- semi-skilled labour with short term employment, the primary target groups being black and coloured people, women, disabled people and young people. Our findings indicate that the EPWP does not significantly enhance the individual’s probability of being employed, nor does it raise the per capita income of households with participating individuals.

The central research question is the extent to which gifted programming affects student academic outcomes of gifted as compared to not-gifted students and how this differs by race/ethnicity and/or poverty status. Since the identification of elementary school students as gifted is not random, propensity score matching is used to remove this bias in the estimates of the effects. A matched sample of North Carolina middle school students based on individual level data of both gifted and not-gifted students of varied racial/ethnic groups and income levels is used for this analysis. This enables a comparison of sixth, seventh, and eighth grade student achievement to determine the extent to which participating in gifted programming differentiates effects by race/ethnicity and poverty status. I show the additional test score gain, if any, from being in gifted programming compared to students not participating in gifted programs. Variations in gifted program effects across race/ethnicity and income are assessed. This research adds empirical evidence to the more qualitatively focused gifted debate by analyzing differences in student outcomes between gifted and not-gifted students in North Carolina. Since black and lower income students are less likely to participate in gifted programs, they disproportionately encounter less experienced teachers, lower expectations, and fewer resources. The extent to which these additional learning supports translate to differences in student outcomes are analyzed.

Education, as an indispensable component of human capital, has been acknowledged to play a critical role in economic growth, which is theoretically elaborated by human capital theory and empirically confirmed by evidence from different parts of the world. The educational impact on growth is especially valuable and meaningful when it is for the sake of poverty reduction and pro-poorness of growth. The paper re-explores the precious link between human capital development and poverty reduction by investigating the causal effect of education accumulation on earnings enhancement for anti-poverty and pro-poor growth. The analysis takes the evidence from a well-known conditional cash transfer (CCT) program — Oportunidades in Mexico. Aiming at alleviating poverty and promoting a better future by investing in human capital for children and youth in poverty, this CCT program has been recognized producing significant outcomes. The study investigates a short-term impact of education on earnings of the economically disadvantaged youth, taking the data of both the program’s treated and untreated youth from urban areas in Mexico from 2002 to 2004. Two econometric techniques, i.e. difference-in-differences and difference-in-differences propensity score matching approach are applied for estimation. The empirical analysis first identifies that youth who under the program’s schooling intervention possess an advantage in educational attainment over their non-intervention peers; with this identification of education discrepancy as a prerequisite, further results then present that earnings of the education advantaged youth increase at a higher rate about 20 percent than earnings of their education disadvantaged peers over the two years. This result indicates a confirmation that education accumulation for the economically disadvantaged young has a positive impact on their earnings enhancement and thus inferring a contribution to poverty reduction and pro-poorness of growth.

Conventional charcoal and firewood are the main source of energy in Haiti. They provide up to 90% of the country’s energy for domestic and industrial use, resulting in severe environmental and health issues. The present study is initiated to better understand the reasons why two promising alternative technologies (improved cookstoves and alternative charcoal briquettes) have experienced low adoption in Haiti. The research was carried out in two districts in southern Haiti where the improved stoves and briquettes production units exist and where households benefited from a program distributing the improved stoves. This project contributes to the literature by gauging interest in the improved stove and briquettes, as well as their specific characteristics. It helps understand factors that affect the adoption and dis-adoption of the technologies. Additionally, the research measures tangible benefits for households that adopted the improved stoves. The study reveals that the use of the improved stoves lowers fuel expenditures by 14.6 cents/day to 23.6 cents/day. Haitian consumers are interested in both the stove and briquettes, but their willingness-to-pay depends on their personal characteristics such as location and income. The study has revealed two surprising results as well: Unnecessary dis-adoption of the stoves occurs because the two technologies were needlessly marketed together. Despite the target audience, which is poor and rural consumers, the improved stove is perceived as a rich, urban user’s technology.

O objetivo dessa dissertação é avaliar o impacto de um programa de treinamento voltado para trabalhadores, utilizando o propensity score matching, mas com dois tipos de abordagem, uma não-paramétrica e a outra semi-paramétrica. Para estimação não paramétrica foi utilizado um método proposto por Li, Racine e Wooldridge (2009) e para estimação semi-paramétrica, o modelo utilizado foi o Generalized Additive Model proposto por Hastie e Tibshirani (1990). Os resultados obtidos indicam que os dois métodos utilizados apresentam estimativas tão boas ou melhores do que quando estimadas paramétricamente. / The goal of this thesis is to evaluate the impact of a job training program using propensity score matching methods with two types of approaches: a nonparametric e another semiparametric. For non-parametric estimation was used a method proposed by Li, Racine and Wooldridge (2009) and for the semiparametric model the Generalized Additive Model proposed by Hastie and Tibshirani (1990). The results indicate that both methods provide estimates as good or better than when parametrically estimated.

abstract: Research on the consequences of gang membership is limited mainly to the study of crime and victimization. This gives the narrow impression that the effects of gang membership do not cascade into other life domains. This dissertation conceptualized gang membership as a snare in the life-course that disrupts progression in conventional life domains. National Longitudinal Survey of Youth Cohort of 1997 (NLSY97) data were used to examine the effects of adolescent gang membership on the nature and patterns of educational attainment and employment over a 12-year period in the life-course. Variants of propensity score weighting were used to assess the effects of gang joining on a range of outcomes pertaining to educational attainment and employment. The key findings in this dissertation include: (1) selection adjustments partially or fully confounded the effects of gang joining; despite this (2) gang joiners had 70 percent the odds of earning a high school diploma and 42 percent the odds of earning a 4-year college degree than matched individuals who avoided gangs; (3) at the 11-year mark, the effect of gang joining on educational attainment exceeded one-half year; (4) gang joiners made up for proximate deficits in high school graduation and college matriculation, but gaps in 4-year college degree and overall educational attainment gained throughout the study; (5) gang joiners were less likely to be employed and more likely to not participate in the labor force, and these differences accelerated toward the end of the study; (6) gang joiners spent an additional one-third of a year jobless relative to their matched counterparts; and (7) the cumulative effect of gang joining on annual income exceeded $14,000, which was explained by the patterning of joblessness rather than the quality of jobs. The theoretical and policy implications of these findings, as well as directions for future research, are addressed in the concluding chapter of this dissertation. / Dissertation/Thesis / Ph.D. Criminology and Criminal Justice 2012

O objetivo dessa dissertação é avaliar o impacto de um programa de treinamento voltado para trabalhadores, utilizando o propensity score matching, mas com dois tipos de abordagem, uma não-paramétrica e a outra semi-paramétrica. Para estimação não paramétrica foi utilizado um método proposto por Li, Racine e Wooldridge (2009) e para estimação semi-paramétrica, o modelo utilizado foi o Generalized Additive Model proposto por Hastie e Tibshirani (1990). Os resultados obtidos indicam que os dois métodos utilizados apresentam estimativas tão boas ou melhores do que quando estimadas paramétricamente. / The goal of this thesis is to evaluate the impact of a job training program using propensity score matching methods with two types of approaches: a nonparametric e another semiparametric. For non-parametric estimation was used a method proposed by Li, Racine and Wooldridge (2009) and for the semiparametric model the Generalized Additive Model proposed by Hastie and Tibshirani (1990). The results indicate that both methods provide estimates as good or better than when parametrically estimated.

O objetivo geral desta pesquisa foi avaliar o impacto da restrição ao crédito rural sobre a produtividade da terra e a produtividade do trabalho para os agricultores familiares do Brasil. Para estimar esse impacto, foram utilizados os dados do Censo Agropecuário de 2006 por município. Para diferenciar os diferentes agricultores familiares, foi utilizado o índice de mercantilização, separando a população em quartis. As estimativas do impacto da restrição ao crédito sobre a produtividade da terra e a produtividade do trabalho foram calculadas a partir da comparação entre o grupo que recebeu crédito e o que não recebeu crédito, obtido através do escore de propensão (propensity score matching). As estimativas do efeito médio de tratamento sobre os tratados, quando apresentaram resultados estatisticamente significativos, evidenciaram os diferentes grupos formados dentro da agricultura familiar. Por exemplo, na região Centro-oeste municípios com crédito tiveram maior produtividade da terra e do trabalho quando pertencentes ao quarto quartil. Os resultados obtidos no modelo estimado mostram que os efeitos da restrição ao crédito rural são diferentes para municípios mais ou menos mercantilizados e, portanto, requerem políticas distintas. / The overall objective of this research is to evaluate the impact of the restriction of rural credit on land and labor productivity for family farmers in Brazil. In order to estimate this impact, we have used data from Brazil\'s 2006 Agricultural Census at the municipal level. To differentiate among family farmers, a trade index was used, separating the population into quartiles. Estimates of the impact of credit restriction on the productivity of land and the productivity of labor were calculated through propensity score matching. Estimates of the average treatment effect on the treated, when presenting statistically significant results, highlight the differences among groups formed within the family farm. For example, in the Midwest of Brazil, municipalities with credit and belonging to the fourth quartile presented higher land and labor productivity. The results of the estimated model confirm that the effects of rural credit restriction are different for municipalities with smaller or larger trade indices, requiring therefore specific policies for each group.

The Zambian government, through the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives (MACO), provides maize seed and fertilizers to farmers at heavily subsidised prices under the Farmer Input Support Programme (FISP). MACO’s narrow evaluation of FISP, based on estimated production without quantifying the significant changes in production and other critical socioeconomic factors, fails to adequately highlight and service the benefits of subsidies to intended beneficiaries. Furthermore, MACO estimates of the impact of FISP never consider the question of how much beneficiary farmers would have produced in its absence, leading to potentially misleading assessments. The key question addressed in this study is whether using more rigorous econometric methods that account for heterogeneity in socioeconomic factors between participants and non-participants would still confirm the positive impact of FISP on maize productivity and poverty reduction, hence justifying the huge government expense on the programme. The study utilised cross-sectional data obtained from 497 randomly selected households, collected in 2011 from six provinces of Zambia to assess the causal effect of FISP on beneficiary households’ maize yields and asset accumulation. The data was analysed using well-grounded matching techniques that account for differences in observable characteristics between programme participants and non-participants. The study also tested for possible unobserved selection effects using the Rosenbaum bounds. The results indicated that participating in FISP increased maize yields and assets accumulation and hence might directly or indirectly positively affect beneficiary poverty levels. There were also no influences of unobserved characteristics on the estimated maize yield and asset level differences between participants and non-participants. On average, FISP increased maize yields by about 451 kg per hectare, with an improvement of about 0.5 on the wealth index (score used to rank households according to asset levels). The positive impact on maize yields and asset accumulation on the participating farmers therefore justifies government’s continued implementation of FISP. / Dissertation (MScAgric)--University of Pretoria, 2014. / lk2014 / Agricultural Economics, Extension and Rural Development / MScAgric / Unrestricted