Chile

Social policies aimed at reducing inequalities in the labour market need to be founded upon a solid understanding of the factors that generate disadvantageous conditions for specific segments of that market. This article describes inequalities in the occupational and income structure affecting economically active women and, in particular, economically active women migrants in Santiago, Chile, and provides some insights into the reasons why these disadvantages exist. Chile’s economic growth process is seen by some as setting an example for other Latin American countries which are opening up their economies to international markets. Steps have to be taken, however, to prevent still greater concentration of wealth, the persistence of high levels of poverty, an increase in the heterogeneity of the labour market and inequalities in wage levels.

This article looks at the bases, objectives and results of the “lateral” trade policy adopted by Chile in the 1990s. In particular, it seeks to give a clearer idea of the role of bilateral agreements and to incorporate into the discussion the empirical evidence observed in the case of Chile. It concludes that the criticisms levelled at this policy, especially by those who advocate unilateral trade openness rather than other options, are based on an incomplete analysis of basic international trade theory. It is therefore argued that the economic concepts taken into account in evaluating the economic and political rationality of this strategy must be expanded to acknowledge the complementarity of the available options and to incorporate the analysis of game theory, the existence of economies of scale, the transaction costs existing in the functioning of international markets, and foreign policy elements. Through this multidimensional strategy, Chile has sought to overcome various problems and to stimulate the areas of its economy which have been most dynamic in the 1990s: exports of products with greater added value, services and capital. By traditional standards of appraisal, the results obtained do not reflect any negative impacts but they do show positive effects.

Closer integration of the Chilean economy into the world economy, based primarily on use of the country’s comparative advantages, has contributed significantly to the changes observed in the performance and the relative positioning of the regions of Chile. This article examines and compares the dynamics of growth in these regions and explains their differing performance. The faster-growing regions have become integrated into the world economy thanks to their renewable and non-renewable natural resources, the development of agro-industrial exports and the presence of cities that have linkages with the global economy as providers of financial and commercial services. Growth in some of the regions has not necessarily translated into social improvements, and this demonstrates the need for explicit social policies.

Working with census information on standardized academic performance tests and using different estimation techniques, this article analyses sociodemographic and management factors affecting the performance of Chile’s municipal schools. The evidence suggests that the system’s lack of flexibility, particularly where teacher dismissal is concerned, is an important factor but not the main cause of poor academic performance. Conversely, the differences in academic performance between municipal schools that can be attributed to management are almost twice the standard deviation of the System for Measuring the Quality of Education (simce) performance test and 20 times the increment ascribed to the “complete school day” initiative, which costs the equivalent of half a point of gross domestic product (gdp).

Latin America’s economics are prone to continual shocks, of both external and internal origin, giving rise to a marked variability in their growth rates. In order to reduce this volatility, it is necessary therefore to establish stabilization mechanisms, including in particular the instruments of fiscal policy. The economies’ increasing variability is prompting the development of fiscal norms that in-corporate anti-cyclical features. Such rules arc based on the setting of medium-term public spending goals that are consistent with the economy’s growth trend and level of public debt but are independent of the cyclical component of the level of activity. In such a system, tax revenues would perform the traditional function of stabilizers of economic fluctuations.

Against a background of increased expenditure and improved equity, this reform of public health management in Chile, set in the context of a dual health system, aims to consolidate a cost advantage over the private sector. Emphasis has been placed on the distinction between the regulatory, financial and supply functions in the public sector, and a relative opposition of interests between them has been encouraged, with a view to generating quasi-markets. The “management commitments” entered into between the Ministry of Health and the Health Services mark a departure from the strategy of resource allocation guided by historical budgets and make results the decisive factor of funding.

This article studies the effect of the stabilization of fiscal expenditure and the anti-cyclical use of taxes as stabilization variables in the Chilean economy, through the calibration of a basic macro-economic model adapted to the actual conditions of that economy. The results show that some 25% of the variability of economic growth could be eliminated by obviating fiscal cyclical impulses through constant growth of public investment and consumption and through anti-cyclical taxes. On the one hand, it is proposed that a system of stabilization of the growth of fiscal expenditure should be established, through a system of rules and degrees of flexibility subject to specific clauses.

A great deal of effort has been put into education reform in Latin America since the early 1990s. Extending the coverage of educational opportunities and improving the quality of the education delivered in schools are crucial for the countries of the region, where education in State schools has often been of a low standard. It is not enough just to study macro education policies as they are formulated by governments and implemented by centralized ministries of education. What is promised or envisioned on paper is often quite different from what actually happens in school establishments. It is important to understand, at the micro level, how schools are functioning in practice as they implement educational policies. Educational policies and social reality come together in school classrooms and schools can teach us a great deal about achieving quality in basic education. The focus of this article is on poor children in poor schools and the continuing challenges of educating children in poor communities. Chile’s national programme to improve the quality of education and educational outcomes in 900 of its poorer primary schools, known as the P900 programme, provided an ideal framework for identifying and studying the challenges faced by schools in poor communities in trying to deliver a high-quality education to their children and for understanding how and why they are struggling to meet national standards. This study is concerned with learning from schools to achieve a better understanding of what they see, in the context of their community and the student population they serve, as the practical realities of educating poor children. At the national level, a macro research methodology was used to identify the worst-performing schools in the P900 programme on the basis of their results in standardized examinations and the trends seen in these results over the 1990s. A small purposive sample of the worstperforming schools was drawn from this group and quota sampling techniques were used to ascertain their main characteristics. A micro study of each of the schools selected was then carried out, involving school visits and interviews to understand school and pupil performance and to identify critical factors that might be amenable to change. In-depth reports were prepared on each school. This article synthesizes the lessons learned from these micro studies.

This article presents a model for dealing systematically with the different matters associated with policies for developing the infrastructure necessary to support a digital economy, identifying the roles of the State and the private sector in this respect. It also describes the main initiatives taken in terms of creating and improving the infrastructure and content in the case of Chile, which illustrates the recent progress made in developing the country’s digital economy and the challenges still pending in this field. There is general agreement that Chile must move closer to those countries already incorporated into the information society, and it must do so quickly and promptly. This study helps to identify the main factors for evaluating the policy aimed at promoting access to the digital economy, which is one of the central pillars for designing policies to advance toward the information society.