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The aim of this paper is to conceptually present measures of performance, cost and efficiency of the public sector and quantify them fo r various services in the Estado Plurinacional de Bolivia. As in all applied research, the work has limitations that originate, fundamentally, in the lack of information. But using the available information some results are obtained that can be challenged in future research. The quantifications show important improvements between 1992 and 2012. In this period, the vertical structure of the general government of Bolivia underwent a profound transformation originated in the process of fiscal decentralization. Expenditure from subnational government levels (departments and municipalities) doubled its share in total spending between 1990 and 2012 and municipal participation went from approximately one third of subnational spending to approximately two thirds. The preliminary conclusion of this work is the existence of a positive relationship between performance in the health, education, and housing and urban services sectors and decentralization. With the improvement in performance also increased the political participation of citizens so that it can be concluded, preliminarily, that the country moved in one of the positive intervals of the federalism frontier of Inman and Rubinstein. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper detects structural similarities among several regions in Chile, in particular those that can be compared to the Magellanic and the Chilean Antarctica region: the regions Tarapacá, Libertador Bernardo O'Higgins Riquelme, Bío- Bío and Los Lagos. This exercise is particularly relevant given the economic characteristics and geographic location of all of them. This comparison would allow less advantaged regions to learn from the most successful ones. Policy makers would be able to evaluate ex-ante different policies, helping in this way the decision making process. To this end, in this paper we follow two approaches: first, we find similarities among regions using Le Masne's (1988) indicator; second, we use one in which the similarities are identified through the productive links, following the methodologies of Rasmussen (1956), Dietzenbacher and van der Linden (1997) and Soza (2007b). Once we determine which technique is better for our problem, a hierarchical cluster is applied to obtain groups of regions based on the relationship they form. It is of particular interest to identify those sectors that have the largest impact on development and analyze its productive linkages. The analysis is done using the 1996 input-output charts developed by National Institute of Statistics (INE) and the Ministry of Planning and Development (MIDEPLAN). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The objective of this paper is to empirically test the deleveraging of the Venezuelan financial system at the event of two contractive shocks, a monetary and an oil shock, and to characterize the types of risks that arise in each case. Although these shocks have similar effects on interest rates and deposits, the adverse consequences and implicit risks for the oil shock are greater, due to its shrivelling effect on real activity and public finances. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many authors stress the importance of relationships between sectors for the economic growth. Therefore the concept of linkage appears in the definition of two of the most traditional concepts in the input-output analysis: the "key sector" and cluster . In this paper , key products and activities are identified for the Chilean regions, the clusters that form and the structural similarity that exists between them. For this, we use a combination of so-called Important Coefficients and Fields of Influence. The results indicate that the regions that are most similar are: Tarapacá and Antofagasta, Biobío and Los Lagos. Besides the "developed" regions concept that is associated with a high division of labor and coordination between sectors, they have similar production structures and are very different from those that have "less development". [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper Bayesian Vector Autoregression (BVAR) models are estimated for the Chilean economy. Under this approach, the transmission mechanisms of monetary policy and forecast exercises are studied and evaluated for the main macroeconomic variables. Then, the results are contrasted with the standard VAR models presented in the previous literature for the case of Chile and the implications for the monetary policy design are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper estimates the residential outage cost in Chile's Central Interconnected System (SIC), using consumer's willingness to pay for energy. We first estimate the cost of reducing energy consumption efficiently, that is only the less valuable kWh (as indicated by the market demand curve) are rationed. Then we estimate the per-kWh cost of rationing by cutting off service. We find that the outage cost varies considerably depending on the length of the rationing period; and on how energy is rationed. Longer restrictions allow users to adjust more, and hence are cheaper. Similarly, we estimate that rationing efficiently is between two and six times cheaper than rationing by cutting off service. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]