Public expenditures taxation and welfare measurement

this article addresses the welfare and macroeconomics effects of fiscal policy in a frarnework where govemment chooses tax rates and the distribution of revenues between consumption and investment. We construct and simulate a model where public consumption affects individuaIs' utility and public capital is an argument of the production function. The simulations suggest that by simply reallocating expenditures from consumption to investment, the govemment can increase the equilibrium leveIs of capital stock, hours worked, output and labor productivity. Funhennore, we 'show that the magnitude and direction of the long run impact of fiscal policy depends on the size of the elasticity of output to public capital. If this parameter is high enough, it may be the case that capital stock, within limits, increases with tax rates.

Implantação de tecnologia de monitoramento remoto para e-service: um estudo exploratório

The purpose of this study is to define measures to increase customer satisfaction and company competitiveness using a remote monitoring technology, in an exploratory study of Alpha Elevator Company (nick name chosen to the company by the actor of the dissertation). Regarding the competitive market, the service industry is striving to achieve productivity, following the example of the manufacturing industry. Nevertheless, these efforts are limited by the amount of hours worked per week, month or year, since the sector charges its services based on the hours spent working on the equipment of the client or based on the numbers of visits. This study is based in the overcoming of the traditional paradigm of selling number of hours by a system of selling results and performance. Employing a remote monitoring system, the elevators under the company service are monitored continually and defects are detected and transmitted to the customer care center, via phone line. The customers can access this data through the Internet and obtain information like availability rate of their elevators and call back response time rate, besides being able to buy products on the company¿s home page and to send feedback. The results were obtained by participating in conferences among experts of the company, in Japan and the United States. Through the analysis of the business environment and based on the bibliographic reference, a strategy was developed to implement e-service as a competitive differentiation.

Aggregate uncertainty, disappointment aversion and the business cycle

We investigate the eff ect of aggregate uncertainty shocks on real variables. More speci fically, we introduce a shock in the volatility of productivity in an RBC model with long-run volatility risk and preferences that exhibit generalised disappointment aversion. We find that, when combined with a negative productivity shock, a volatility shock leads to further decline in real variables, such as output, consumption, hours worked and investment. For instance, out of the 2% decrease in output as a result of both shocks, we attribute 0.25% to the e ffect of an increase in volatility. We also fi nd that this e ffect is the same as the one obtained in a model with Epstein-Zin- Weil preferences, but higher than that of a model with expected utility. Moreover, GDA preferences yield superior asset pricing results, when compared to both Epstein-Zin-Weil preferences and expected utility.

Economic growth and complementarity between stages of human capital

We study the impact of the different stages of human capital accumulation on the evolution of labor productivity in a model calibrated to the U.S. from 1961 to 2008. We add early childhood education to a standard continuous time life cycle economy and assume complementarity between educational stages. There are three sectors in the model: the goods sector, the early childhood sector and the formal education sector. Agents are homogenous and choose the intensity of preschool education, how long to stay in formal school, labor effort and consumption, and there are exogenous distortions to these four decisions. The model matches the data very well and closely reproduces the paths of schooling, hours worked, relative prices and GDP. We find that the reduction in distortions to early education in the period was large and made a very strong contribution to human capital accumulation. However, due to general equilibrium effects of labor market taxation, marginal modification in the incentives for early education in 2008 had a smaller impact than those for formal education. This is because the former do not decisively affect the decision to join the labor market, while the latter do. Without labor taxation, incentives for preschool are significantly stronger.

Os efeitos da redução da jornada de trabalho de 48 para 44 horas semanais sobre o mercado de trabalho no Brasil

The reduction of standard weekly working hours from the curreilt leveI of 44 hours to 40 hours has recently been proposed by the main central unions as a way to create jobs and reduce unemployment in Brazil. The idea, known as work-sharing, is that the reduction in average hours per worker allows the same tasks to be performed bymore employees. However, the notion ofwork-sharing has been challenged by the theoretical and the empirical literature. Theory says that, in general, a reduction in the duration ofthe workweek tends to decrease employment. Work-sharing is even less likely in the case of no wage restraint, when monthly wages are not proportionally reduced. Recent cautious econometric evidence also conflict with the notion of work -sharing (Hunt, 1999, and Crépon and Kramarz, 2000). The objective ofthis paper is to study the effects ofthe workweek length reduction from 48 to 44 hours, prescribed by the 1988 Constitutional change, on the Brazilian labor market. We find that: i) the reduction of standard working hours was followed by a significant decrease in actual working hours: 60,7% ofthe employees that worked between 45 and 48 weekly hours in 1988 (the affected group) and that remained employed in 1989 switched to a 40-44 hours workweek; ii) belonging to the affected group in 1988 had no statistical effect on the probability ofbecoming unemployed, exiting the labor market, or switching to an informal job in 1989; iii) the reduction in working hours implied a 8,8% increase in hourly real wages with respect to those that remained employed at 40-44 hours a week. In sum, the reduction of standard working hours in 1988 reduced actual working hours, did not affect the probability ofa typical worker to lose hisjob in 1989, and implied a relative increase in hourly real wages.