Income and bargaining effects on education and health

In this paper, we examine the impacts of the reform in the rural pension system in Brazil in 1991 on schooling and health indicators. In addition, we use the reform to investigate the validity of the unitary model of household allocation by testing if there were uneven impacts on those indicators depending on the gender of the recipient. The main conclusion of the paper is that the reform had significantly positive effects on the outcomes of interest, especially on those co-residing with a male pensioner, indicating that the unitary model is not a well-specified framework to understand family allocation decisions. The highest impacts were on school attendance for boys, literacy for girls and illness for middle-age people. We explore a collective model as defined by Chiappori (1992) as one possible alternative representation for the decision-making process of the poor rural Brazilian families. In the cooperative Nash equilibrium, the reform effects can be divided into two pieces: a direct income effect and bargaining power effect. The data support the existence of these two different effects

Knowledge effect on firm performance in manufacturing and service firms

This thesis seeks to examine the difference between manufacturing and service firms with respect to the effects of knowledge on performance, and the influence of market turbulence in this relationship. Empirical data, resulting from a survey, was collected from more than 1,206 firms, involving several sectors. Two samples were analyzed, one with 334 manufacturing and other with 509 service firms. The findings indicate no significant difference in the importance of knowledge on performance between these sectors in the absence of market turbulence: knowledge development (KD) has a stronger effect than culture of competitiveness (CC) on firm performance. However, under market turbulence, manufacturers differ from service providers. The positive effect of KD is enhanced, while the positive effect of CC remains the same for manufacturing firms. On the other hand, the positive effect of KD is diminished, while the positive effect of CC is enhanced for service firms. This supports the argument concerning differences in the nature of manufacturing and service industries. From a managerial point of view, results confirm the importance of knowledge, irrespective of firm sector or market turbulence. However, while industrial firms should center efforts on KD, service firms must find a balance where knowledge development (e.g. norms, processes, routines) does not impair their culture of competitiveness (e.g. learning, innovation, action). The thesis contributes to existing literature by proposing that: (1) the positive effect of knowledge on performance is confirmed; (2) under turbulent markets manufacturing and service firms have different responses concerning the influence of knowledge on performance; (3) a multidimensional performance construct based on cost, profitability, and growth is an interesting way to evaluate firm sustained competitive advantage, rather than one-dimensional constructs; (4) the CC x KD interaction, found relevant for supply chains in previous studies, is not supported for firms; (5) differences in unit of analysis, e.g. from supply chains to firms, result in different effects of KD and CC on firm performance; (6) existing scales can be improved with the addition of more diverse indicators, capturing a wider range of concepts (e.g. information transfer measurement); and (7) results from previous studies are supported for Brazilian firms, contributing for theory generalization.

Health and development with imperfect capital markets

This paper investigates the interaction between investment in education and in life-expanding investments, in a simple two-period model in which individuaIs are liquidity constrained in the first period. We show that under low leveIs of health and capital, investments in human capital and in health are complement: since the probability of survival is small, there is littIe incentive to invest in human capital; therefore the return on health investment is also low. This reinforcing effect does not hold for higher leveIs of health or capital, and the two investments become substitute. This property has many consequences. First, subsidizing health care may have dramatically different effects on private investment in human capital, depending on the initial leveI of health and capital. Second, the assumption that mortality is endogenous induces an increase in inequality of income: since health investment is a normal good, the return on education is also lower for poor individuaIs. Third,in a non-overlapping generation madel with non-altruistic agents, the hea1th leveI of the population has strong consequences on growth. For a very low leveI of hea1th, mortality is too high for the investment on education to be profitable. For a higher, but still low, levei of hea1th the economy grows on1y if the initial stock of capital is high enough; bad health and low capital create a poverty trapo Fourth, we compare redistributive income policies versus public hea1th measures. Redistributing income reduces both static and dynamic inequality, but slows growth. In contrast, a paternalistic health policy that forces the poor to invest in hea1th reduces dynamic inequality and may foster growth.

Determinantes macroeconômicos da estrutura a termo da taxa de juros na América Latina

O trabalho relaciona, com um modelo de três fatores proposto por Huse (2007), variáveis macroeconômicas e financeiras observáveis com a estrutura a termo da taxa de juros (ETTJ) dos países da América Latina (Brasil, Chile, Colômbia e México). Consideramos os seguintes determinantes macroeconômicos: taxa de inflação, taxa de variação do nível de atividade, variação da taxa de câmbio, nível do credit default swaps (CDS), nível da taxa de desemprego, nível da taxa de juros nominal e fatores globais (inclinação da curva de juros norte-americana e variação de índices de commodities). Os modelos explicam mais do que 75% nos casos do Brasil, Chile e Colômbia e de 68% no caso do México. Variações positivas no nível de atividade e inflação são acompanhadas, em todos os países, de um aumento na ETTJ. Aumentos do CDS, com exceção do Chile, acarretam em aumento das taxas longas. Já crescimentos na taxa de desemprego têm efeitos distintos nos países. Ao mesmo tempo, depreciações cambiais não são acompanhadas de subida de juros, o que pode ser explicado pelos bancos centrais considerarem que depreciações de câmbio tem efeitos transitórios na inflação. No México, aumentos na ETTJ são diretamente relacionados com o índice de commodities de energia e metálicas. Já no caso brasileiro, em que os preços da gasolina são regulados e não impactam a inflação, esse canal não é relevante. Variações positivas na inclinação da curva norte-americana têm efeitos similares nas curvas da América Latina, reduzindo as taxas curtas e aumentando as taxas longas.

The impact of content marketing on attitudes and purchase intentions of online shoppers : the case videos & tutorials and user-generated content

This thesis was written as part of a Double-Degree Masters program in Management, with focus in Marketing. Aligned with the nature of the degree, this study aims to be a useful tool for managers and marketers, which conduct business online. This thesis is a study of Content Marketing in the content of online commercial product pages. Its aim is to understand how to use content marketing to drive conversion, by understanding consumer attitudes and purchase intention towards content. A in-depth study of existing theories and exploratory primary research was developed in other to attain these objectives. Business-to-consumer electronic commerce (B2C e-commerce) has provided consumers and online retailers with a more effective medium to perform online transactions through commercial websites. Although consumers have realized that the benefits of online shopping; such as time saving, minimizing effort, convenience, broader selection, and wider access to information, they are still greatly unwilling to shop online. Consumers shop essentially for two motives, to meet experiential (fun) or goal-oriented (efficiency) needs (Wolfinbarger & Gilly, 2001). The information provided by content marketing seeks to focus on consumers need for information and entertainment, instead of focusing on the brand. Thus, it is expected that the type of content format will have different effects on the attitudes and purchase intention on the online shopper, depending on the online shopping purpose. Concretely, a goal-oriented shopper should find user generated content (UGC) to be more valuable content formats, since they decrease the amount of search effort. While on the other hand, videos & tutorials (VT) might be perceived as more valuable for a consumer looking to spend time and being entertained through online shopping. The exploratory research was characterized by a survey experiment with online consumers. Participants were exposed to stimuli of content marketing tested according to their attitudes and purchase intention. The focus was to understand the impact of two different content marketing tactics—User-generated content and Videos & Tutorials—on attitudes and purchase intentions and how they interact with content complexity. The results indicate that content marketing in commercial product pages is relevant in driving consumer attitudes and purchase intentions. Consumers are not motivated by a specific content marketing tactic, unless that content has a certain level of complexity. In that case, Ur-Generated Content becomes a relevant tactic in product pages, however VT is not.

Windows of opportunities and knowledge networks: implications for the catch-up in developing countries

This document represents a doctoral thesis held under the Brazilian School of Public and Business Administration of Getulio Vargas Foundation (EBAPE/FGV), developed through the elaboration of three articles. The research that resulted in the articles is within the scope of the project entitled “Windows of opportunities and knowledge networks: implications for catch-up in developing countries”, funded by Support Programme for Research and Academic Production of Faculty (ProPesquisa) of Brazilian School of Public and Business Administration (EBAPE) of Getulio Vargas Foundation.