Essays on household taxation and competition between heterogeneous firms

Essa tese é constituída por três artigos: "Tax Filing Choices for the Household", "Optimal Tax for the Household: Collective and Unitary Approaches" e "Vertical Differentiation and Heterogeneous Firms".

Household borrowing constraints and monetary policy in emerging economies

Credit markets in emerging economies can be distinguished from those in advanced economies in many respects, including the collateral required for households to borrow. This work proposes a DSGE framework to analyze one peculiarity that characterizes the credit markets of some emerging markets: payroll-deducted personal loans. We add the possibility for households to contract long-term debt and compare two different types of credit constraints with one another, one based on housing and the other based on future income. We estimate the model for Brazil using a Bayesian technique. The model is able to solve a puzzle of the Brazilian economy: responses to monetary shocks at first appear to be strong but dissipate quickly. This occurs because income – and the amount available for loans – responds more rapidly to monetary shocks than housing prices. To smooth consumption, agents (borrowers) compensate for lower income and for borrowing by working more hours to repay loans and erase debt in a shorter time. Therefore, in addition to the income and substitution effects, workers consider the effects on their credit constraints when deciding how much labor to supply, which becomes an additional channel through which financial frictions affect the economy.

Consumo, poupança precaucionária, lei crédito consignado e impacto sobre alocação de ativos e distribuição de consumo

Esta tese é composta por três ensaios a respeito de consumo e poupança. O primeiro traz uma aplicação de poupança precaucionária para os Estados Unidos. O segundo e terceiro artigos fazem aplicações para o Brasil usando a POF 1995-96, 2002-03 e 2008- 09 para o segundo, e as duas últimas pesquisas para o terceiro. O segundo artigo avalia convergência nos padrões de gastos das famílias em duas cestas distintas de bens: uma de alimentos e outra para produtos eletroeletrônicos, enquanto o terceiro artigo explora a Lei de Crédito Consignado e seu impacto na forma de alocação da poupança precaucionária das famílias.