Publications

November 2004
Article

Unemployment Benefits As a Substitute for a Conservative Central Banker

By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch

In the many years since their introduction, positive theories of inflation have rarely been tested. This paper documents a negative relationship between inflation and the welfare state (proxied by the parameters of the unemployment benefit program) that is to be... View Details

Keywords: Unemployment; Welfare State; Compensation and Benefits; Inflation and Deflation

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March 2006 (Revised November 2006)
Case

China: To Float or Not To Float? (D)- Bank of America's Strategic Investment in China Construction Bank

By: Laura Alfaro, Rafael M. Di Tella and Ingrid Vogel

With its $3 billion investment in Chinese state bank China Construction Bank, Bank of America--the second U.S. bank behind Citigroup in terms of assets and market capitalization--was one of several foreign banks directly participating in China's banking sector reform.... View Details

Keywords: Currency Exchange Rate; Banks and Banking; Foreign Direct Investment; International Relations; Banking Industry; China; United States

April 2010 (Revised October 2010)
Case

The International Criminal Court

By: Rafael M. Di Tella and Natalie Kindred

This Case describes a controversial 2010 decision by the International Criminal Court (ICC) and alludes to some of the broader challenges of building international institutions. The case briefly highlights certain milestones in international relations preceding the... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Decision Choices and Conditions; International Relations; Political Elections; Courts and Trials; Organizations; Kenya

December 2013 (Revised March 2024)
Case

Breaking Bad (the Rules): Argentina Defaults, Inflates (and Grows), 1997–2015

By: Rafael Di Tella and Fernanda Miguel

In late October 2011, after losing 1 billion of dollar reserves in one month, the Argentine government began imposing a series of currency controls, limiting the ability to buy foreign currency. As of October 2011, Argentina's tax collection agency AFIP had been... View Details

Keywords: Default; Inflation; Inflation and Deflation; Currency; Governance Controls; Argentina

April 2005
Article

Partisan Social Happiness

By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch

We use a new approach to study questions in political economy that relies on data on the subjective well-being of a large sample of people living in the OECD over the period 1975-1992. Controlling for the personal characteristics of the respondents, year and country... View Details

Keywords: Political Partisanship; Political Economy; Society; Happiness

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March 2008 (Revised April 2009)
Case

Eliot Spitzer: Pushing Wall Street to Reform

By: Rawi Abdelal, Rafael Di Tella and Jonathan Schlefer

New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer faced a decision about how to stop wrongdoing committed by major Wall Street firms during the Internet boom. The equities analysts of Merrill Lynch and other Wall Street firms were charged with objectively advising retail... View Details

Keywords: Crime and Corruption; Decisions; Financial Institutions; Stocks; Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Laws and Statutes; Lawsuits and Litigation; Conflict of Interests; Internet; Financial Services Industry; United States

Article

Gross National Happiness As an Answer to the Easterlin Paradox?

By: Rafael Di Tella and Robert MacCulloch

The Easterlin Paradox refers to the fact that happiness data are typically stationary in spite of considerable increases in income. This amounts to a rejection of the hypothesis that current income is the only argument in the utility function. We find that the... View Details

Keywords: Wealth and Poverty; Happiness; Employment; Income; Mathematical Methods; Welfare

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November 2020 (Revised March 2023)
Teaching Note

Unrest in Chile

By: Vincent Pons, John Masko, Rafael Di Tella and William Mullins

In 2020, Chileans would head to the ballot box to decide their country’s future. Many international observers credited Chile’s decades of neoliberal governance with turning the country into Latin America’s “Tiger,” a prosperous, diversified economy on its way to... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Macroeconomics; Economy; Political Elections; Public Opinion; Social Issues; Equality and Inequality; System Shocks; Chile; Latin America

March 2005 (Revised July 2007)
Case

Capital Controls in Chile in the 1990s (A)

By: Laura Alfaro, Rafael M. Di Tella and Ingrid Vogel

In 1991, Chile adopted a framework of capital controls focused on reducing the massive flows of foreign investment coming into the country as international interest rates remained low. Capital inflows threatened the Central Bank's ability to manage the exchange rate... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Economic Growth; Financial Crisis; Capital; Governance Controls; Business and Government Relations; Chile

March 2006 (Revised April 2010)
Case

China: To Float or Not To Float? (A)

By: Laura Alfaro, Rafael M. Di Tella and Ingrid Vogel

On July 21, 2005 China revalued its decade-long quasi-fixed exchange rate of approximately 8.28 yuan per U.S. dollar by 2.1% to 8.11 and, at the same time, introduced a more market-based exchange rate system. Many analysts and economists were disappointed with what... View Details

Keywords: Macroeconomics; Trade; Currency Exchange Rate; Governance Controls; Policy; Growth and Development Strategy; China

December 2018
Article

Introduction to Argentine Exceptionalism

By: Edward L. Glaeser, Rafael Di Tella and Lucas Llach

This article is an introduction to the special collection on Argentine Exceptionalism. First, we discuss why the case of Argentina is generally regarded as exceptional: the country was among the richest in the world at the beginning of the 20th century, but it... View Details

Keywords: Argentine Exceptionalism; Economic History; Economy; History; Argentina

April 2020 (Revised July 2020)
Case

Unrest in Chile

By: Vincent Pons, William Mullins, John Masko, Annelena Lobb and Rafael Di Tella

In 2020, Chileans would head to the ballot box to decide their country’s future. Many international observers credited Chile’s decades of neoliberal governance with turning the country into Latin America’s “Tiger,” a prosperous, diversified economy on its way to... View Details

Keywords: Developing Countries and Economies; Macroeconomics; Economy; Political Elections; Public Opinion; Social Issues; Equality and Inequality; System Shocks; Chile; Latin America