Alejandro Estefan, assistant professor in the Keough School of Global Affairs and Kellogg faculty fellow, was recently awarded second place for the Citibanamex Prize in Economics for his co-authored paper “Outsourcing Policy and Worker Outcomes: Causal Evidence from a Mexican Ban.”
The Citibanamex prize is Mexico’s most distinguished award in economic science. Awarded annually, it recognizes research that relates to analysis and solutions for problems in Mexico.
The paper dives into research on the causal impact of labor policies on wage markdowns using confidential Mexican Economic census data from 1994 to 2019. This research leveraged data from a manufacturing panel survey from 2013 to 2023 and a natural experiment featuring a ban on domestic outsourcing in 2021 to find that the ban drastically reduced outsourcing, increased wages, and reduced measured markdowns without lowering output or employment. It was also found that this alteration reduced capital investment and increased the probability of market exit.
Alejandro Estefan is an assistant professor of development economics in the Keough School of Global Affairs. He specialized in development economics, labor economics, public finance, and macroeconomic policy.