Person:
Acosta, Pablo Ariel
Author Name Variants
Fields of Specialization
Labor economics,
Migration,
Skills and workforce development,
International trade,
Social protection and labor,
Social protection and growth
Degrees
ORCID
External Links
Departments
Global Practice on Social Protection and Jobs
Externally Hosted Work
Contact Information
Last updated
January 31, 2023
Biography
Pablo A. Acosta, an Argentinean national, graduated from his Ph.D. in Economics at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2006 and joined the World Bank in 2008 where he works as a Senior Economist in the Social Protection and Jobs Global Practice. Prior to his position at the World Bank, he worked at the CAF Latin American Development Bank, at the Ministry of Economy in Argentina, and the Foundation for Latin American Economic Research (FIEL). His main areas of work and research are social protection, labor economics, migration, skills, and wage inequality.
Publication Search Results
1 - 10 of 31
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Publication
What is the Impact of International Remittances on Poverty and Inequality in Latin America?
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-06)Workers' remittances have become a major source of income for developing countries. However, little is still known about their impact on poverty and inequality. Using a large cross-country panel dataset, the authors find that remittances in Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries have increased growth and reduced inequality and poverty. These results are robust to the use of different instruments that attempt to correct for the potential endogeneity of remittances. Household survey-based estimates for 10 LAC countries confirm that remittances have negative albeit relatively small inequality and poverty-reducing effects, even after imputations for the potential home earnings of migrants. -
Publication
The Impact of Remittances on Poverty and Human Capital : Evidence from Latin American Household Surveys
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2007-06)This paper explores the impact of remittances on poverty, education, and health in 11 Latin American countries using nationally representative household surveys and making an explicit attempt to account for one of the inherent costs associated with migration-the potential income that the migrant may have made at home. The main findings of the study are the following: (1) regardless of the counterfactual used remittances appear to lower poverty levels in most recipient countries; (2) yet despite this general tendency, the estimated impacts tend to be modest; and (3) there is significant country heterogeneity in the poverty reduction impact of remittances' flows. Among the aspects that have been identified in the paper that may lead to varying outcomes across countries are the percentage of households reporting remittances income, the share of remittances of recipient households belonging to the lowest quintiles of the income distribution, and the relative importance of remittances flows with respect to GDP. While remittances tend to have positive effects on education and health, this impact is often restricted to specific groups of the population. -
Publication
Labor Supply, School Attendance, and Remittances from International Migration : The Case of El Salvador
(Washington, DC, 2006-04)The objective of this paper is to present microeconomic evidence on the economic effects of international remittances on households' spending decisions. Remittances can increase the household budget and reduce liquidity constraint problems, allowing more consumption and investment. In particular, remittances can afford investing in children's human capital, a key outcome for the discussion of the perspective of growth in a high recipient developing country. Robust estimates that take into account both selection and endogeneity problems in estimating an average impact of remittances are substantially different from least squares (OLS) estimates presented in previous studies, indicating the importance of dealing with these methodological concerns. After controlling for household wealth and using selection correction techniques such as propensity score matching as well as village and household networks as instruments for remittances receipts, average estimates suggest that girls and young boys (less than 14 years old) from recipient households seem to be more likely to be enrolled at school than those from nonrecipient households. Remittances are also negatively related to child labor and adult female labor supply, while adult male labor force participation remains unaffected on average. The results signaling that the additional income derived from migration increases girls' education and reduces women's labor supply, with no major impact on activity choice for males 14 years or older, suggest the presence of gender differences in the use of remittances across (and possibly, within) households. -
Publication
Informal Jobs and Trade Liberalisation in Argentina
(Taylor and Francis, 2014-06-20)Rapid trade liberalization can exert profound effects on labor markets. Domestic firms, to sustain competitiveness for survival, could react through cutting labor benefits to achieve cost reductions. Alternatively, trade liberalization may alter the industry composition of firms changing the aggregate formality rates. This paper studies the relationship between trade liberalization and informality in Argentina. Using manufacturing industry-level data for 1992-2003, the results confirm the hypothesis that trade increases informality in industries that experience sudden foreign competition. This explains about a third of the increase in informality. Sectors with higher investment ratios are able to neutralize and reverse this effect. -
Publication
Adults’ Cognitive and Socioemotional Skills and their Labor Market Outcomes in Colombia
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2015-09)Previous research has shown that people with higher cognitive skills (mental abilities) and socioemotional skills (behaviors and personality) get better labor market outcomes. It is unclear, however, if this conclusion applies to low- and middle-income countries, given that existing literature builds on studies that are dominantly about highincome countries. In this paper, we explore how cognitive and socioemotional skills of adults, ages 15–64, relate to their labor market outcomes in the context of Colombia. Controlling for a range of confounding factors in a crosssectional survey, we do find that adults with higher skills also have better outcomes, while cognitive and socioemotional skills correlate with different ones and seemingly through different channels. Adults with higher cognitive skills have better jobs (with higher earnings, more formal, and highskilled) and are more likely to complete tertiary education. Socioemotional skills correlate more modestly with having a better job but more strongly with labor market participation and tertiary-education completion. Results suggest that adults with both cognitive and socioemotional skills tend to do better in the labor market and that policies boosting the development of both types may be beneficial in Colombia. -
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What Is the Impact of International Remittances on Poverty and Inequality in Latin America?
( 2008)Workers' remittances have become a major source of income for developing countries. However, little is still known about their impact on poverty and inequality. Using a large cross-country panel dataset, we find that remittances in Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries have increased growth and reduced inequality and poverty. These results are robust to the use of different instruments that attempt to correct for the potential endogeneity of remittances. Household survey-based estimates for 10 LAC countries confirm that remittances have negative albeit relatively small inequality and poverty-reducing effects, even after imputations for the potential home earnings of migrants. -
Publication
The Philippines Sustainable Livelihood Program: Providing and Expanding Access to Employment and Livelihood Opportunities
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2018-05)The Philippines Department of Social Welfare and Development has taken the lead in providingopportunities for income generating activities/livelihood development through the implementationof the Sustainable Livelihood Program (SLP) since 2011, with the objective to reduce poverty andinequality by generating employment among poor households and by moving highly vulnerablehouseholds into sustainable livelihoods and toward economic stability. This note describes the design and core processes of the SLP and reflects on the opportunities that the program has to improve and complement other Social Protection programs to make an impact on households’ welfare, and provides recommendations to maximize its impact. -
Publication
Minds and Behaviors at Work: Boosting Socioemotional Skills for Latin America’s Workforce
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2016-07-11)Although the Latin American region has shown an impressive growth in educational attainment over the past two decades, that education has failed to yield expected benefits. A mounting body of research and policy debates argues that the quantity of education is not an adequate metric of human capital acquisition. Rather, individuals’ skills—what they actually know and can do—should stand as policy targets and be fostered across the life course. Evidence from around the world shows that both cognitive and socio-emotional skills are demanded by employers and favorably affect a range of outcomes, including educational attainment and employment outcomes. Through original empirical research investigating the role of cognitive and socio-emotional skills in shaping adults’ labor market outcomes in Bolivia, Colombia, El Salvador, and Peru, supplemented by similar studies in other Latin American countries, this review confirms that cognitive skills matter for reaping labor market gains in terms of higher wages and formal jobs in Latin America; but so do socio-emotional skills. Moreover, socio-emotional skills seem to particularly influence labor force participation and tertiary education attendance as a platform to build knowledge. The study also presents a policy framework for skills development by: (i) providing insights by developmental psychologists about when people are neuro-biologically, socio-emotionally, and situationally ready to develop socio-emotional skills, and (ii) suggesting new directions in cognitive development. -
Publication
Investing in Skills to Promote Inclusive Growth in Mindanao
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-09)In 2015, the World Bank embarked on a collaborative effort to understand and address the jobs challenge in Mindanao through the Mindanao Jobs Report (MJR). Good jobs — jobs that raise real income and lift people out of poverty — were needed for more than two million Mindanawons who were either unemployed or underemployed at the time of writing. In addition, large cohorts of youth would enter the labor force in the next few years and better jobs were needed for the many Mindanawons who were currently employed informally and who accounted for more than half of total employment in Mindanao. Following extensive consultations with many of Mindanao's leaders and stakeholders, the report came up with recommendations around the three areas, namely: (1) raising agricultural productivity and improving farm-to-market connectivity; (2) boosting human development; and (3) addressing drivers of conflict and fragility and building up institutions in Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM) and conflict-affected areas. -
Publication
Making Payments More Efficient for the Philippines Conditional Cash Transfer Program
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-09-29)The Pantawid Pamilyang Pilipino Program (Pantawid Pamilya) has rapidly expanded to become the largest social protection and human development program in the Philippines. Over the last decade, the evolution of the Pantawid Pamilya was not only about its size and coverage, but also related to the program design and the quality of implementation. Payment is one of key elements which improved over time; however, severe challenges that hamper their efficiency remain unaddressed. For instance, the 4Ps has not taken full advantage of the existing payment system in the Philippines yet. The Pantawid Pamilya has great potential to increase the use of electronic payments, which significantly saves time and removes paperbased documentation. Thus, this note recommends the Government of the Philippines to develop a strategic payment reform agenda, under which 4Ps should allow beneficiaries to receive payments at any transaction account of their choice. In parallel, it is key to revisit business processes and invest in the management information system to reduce manual transactions to achieve more efficient payment. Beyond efficiency, the Pantawid Pamilya program can also strategically leverage different financial modalities/service providers to promote the financial inclusion agenda for beneficiaries. While service providers currently see the Pantawid Pamilya payout as a goodwill rather than a business opportunity, there is great potential for beneficiaries to become the customers of their products and services with a mainstream account.