Juan Pablo Díaz-Sánchez, Cintya Lanchimba, Moisés Obaco
This article presents a special issue of research papers devoted to the study of well-being and quality of life, considering both progress and challenges, in Latin American and Caribbean cities.
Keywords: Well-being; quality of life; Latin America; Caribbean
Grace Carolina Guevara-Rosero, Alexander Sarango-Iturralde, Andrés García-Suaza
While migrants pursue better incomes, they might be driven by differences in amenities between the place of origin and destination. This study aims to determine the effect of differences in health, educational amenities, and the operational capacity between the place of origin and destination on the life satisfaction of internal migrants. To do so, a generalized ordered logit model is estimated using data from the Survey of Employment, Unemployment and Underemployment of Ecuador for the editions from 2015 to 2017. Our results show that income and amenities are not competing reasons for life satisfaction, they go hand in hand. Differences in health and educational amenities, as well as variations in the operational capacity of local governments between the places of origin and destination, have an influence on the life satisfaction of internal migrants. These effects vary depending on the age of the migrant, the size of the city of origin and destination, the reason for migration, and the duration of residence.
Keywords: Migration; life satisfaction; regional amenities
Moisés Obaco, Juan Pablo Díaz-Sánchez, Cintya Lanchimba
Slums are a global concern due to their impact on urban health and urban planning. Although Latin America and the Caribbean is one of the most urbanized developing regions, slums are still a significant concern. However, most studies have concentrated on a single city, using a sample of Latin American and Caribbean (LAC) countries or treating the region as one unit to analyze income inequality and urban primacy. Here, we present an analysis of the relationship between slums and urban primacy for LAC countries for the 1990–2020 period, controlling for GDP per capita and public spending on housing. In addition, we model the relationship between slums and demographic variables such as the fertility rate, migration rate, and urbanization. The analysis is based on panel data from the World Bank and The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). During the period of study, a clear positive relationship is evident between urban primacy in the largest city and the slum rate in each LAC country. However, a high level of heterogeneity is observed in this relationship and our model explains the variation in the slum rate within countries better than the variation between countries.
Keywords: Slums; panel data; Latin America; urban primacy; urbanization
Edith Marcial Ramírez, Roberto Iván Fuentes Contreras, Karina Isabel Salinas Solís
Urban growth has led to the unforeseen development of peripheral urbanization. The case of the city of Tijuana represents, in a peculiar way, the concern about the acquisition and investment in housing. The rugged topography has caused excessive costs of urbanization and the introduction of services that have limited urban development. The objective of this research is to describe the urban environment based on its resources and housing location, as well as to demonstrate its implications on urban spatial inequality. Through a hedonic price model with data from the Sistema Nacional de Información e Indicadores de Vivienda (SNIIV) from 2015 to 2021. Among the main findings is that the price per square meter of new homes purchased by national residents rises as one moves to the outskirts of the city. In addition, the highest and lowest income deciles are living in peripheral areas.
Keywords: Housing; hedonic model; residential location; periphery
Clara María Karis, María Laura Zulaica
Latin American cities show accelerated processes of expanding growth with direct consequences on the quality of life of their inhabitants. In this context, the article analyzes the uses of public green spaces and the preferences of the population in an intermediate Argentine city and its periurban area, based on data from a survey conducted among visitors of these spaces. The results indicate that the evaluated aspects are associated with the natural and sociocultural attributes of these spaces and the characteristics of the respondents, highlighting the interaction and differences between objective and subjective variables of quality of life, especially in the urban-rural gradient.
Keywords: Green infrastructure; survey; cultural ecosystem services; case study; periurban area
Roberto Mauricio Sánchez-Torres
The Pacific is the region of Colombia with the greatest economic lag and the lowest living standards of its population. The objective of this study is to investigate poverty in the Colombian Pacific, taking as a reference the multidimensional approach, applying different identification methodologies and aggregation indicators. The main result is that despite the reduction in poverty between 2010 and 2018, it has not been systematic and has presented much more moderate levels than the situation in the rest of the country; in particular, the region has great deficiencies in education levels and access to health.
Keywords: Colombia; Colombian Pacific region; multidimensional poverty; quality of life; welfare economics
Manuel Tiberio Flórez Calderón, Tito Morales Pinzón, Jorge Luis Ceballos Liévano
Keywords: Vulnerability; tourism; climate change; ecosystems; Risaralda
Mercy Orellana, Joselin Segovia, Rodrigo García Arancibia
In this study we aim at estimating the economic return to education with a territorial perspective. Furthermore, we aim at identifying the effect of the family’s social capital, proxied by language of parents, on the economic returns to education. Results show that education provides different returns to individuals that differ by their family backgrounds, with a significant disadvantage on children whose parents speak an indigenous language. We observe that the territory can contribute to these disparities by up to 7%.
Keywords: Social capital; language; education; economic returns; territory
Paula Herrera Idárraga, Helena María Hernández, Martha Susana Jaimes
Keywords: Care provision; segregation; employment