Essays in Political Economy

Abstract

This dissertation is composed of three essays in Political Economy. The first essay investigates the role and consequences of political connections in the selection of public sector employees. The second essay examines the determinants of individual attitudes towards gender roles in the labor market. The third essay investigates the relationship between individual perceptions about intergenerational mobility and preferences for redistributions. In the first essay, which is joint work with Emanuele Colonnelli and Mounu Prem, we study patronage in the allocation of public sector jobs in Brazilian local governments. We first document the presence of significant political favoritism in the allocation of jobs throughout the entire Brazilian public sector hierarchy. We then show that patronage is the leading explanation behind this favoritism and that patronage has significant real consequences for the quality of the selected public workers. Finally, we present evidence suggesting that patronage practices are associated with a worse provision of public services. In the second essay, I ask whether demographic shocks can affect the long-run evolution of female labor force participation and gender norms. I trace current variation in women’s participation in the labor force within Sub-Saharan Africa to the emergence of a female- biased sex ratio during the centuries of the transatlantic slave trade: women whose ancestors were more exposed to this historical shock are today more likely to be in the labor force, have lower levels of fertility, and are more likely to participate in household decisions. I provide evidence that the marriage market and the cultural transmission of internal norms across generations represent important mechanisms explaining this long-run persistence. In the third essay, which is joint work with Alberto Alesina and Stefanie Stantcheva, we use new cross-country survey and experimental data, to investigate how beliefs about intergenerational mobility affect preferences for redistribution. We find that Americans are more optimistic than Europeans about social mobility. We show that individuals who have more pessimistic views about mobility are more in support of redistributive policies. However, this effect is present only among left-wing respondents, possibly because right-wing respondents see the government as a “problem" and not as the “solution."