Maria Micaela Sviatschi

Making a narco

Maria Micaela Sviatschi has examined childhood exposure to illegal labor markets and criminal life paths. She provides evidence that exposure to illegal labor markets during childhood leads to the formation of industry-specific human capital at an early age, put-ting children on a criminal life path. Using the timing of US anti-drug policies, she shows that when the return to illegal activities increases in coca suitable areas in Peru, parents increase the use of child labor for coca farming, putting children on a criminal life path. The affected children are 30% more likely to be incarcerated for violent and drug-related crimes as adults.

Ms. Sviatschi’s research interests are labor and development economics, with a focus on human capital, gender-violence and crime. She has worked on the development of crim-inal skills in drug trafficking organizations in Peru and gangs in El Salvador. In addi-tion, she studies how criminal organizations such as gangs and drug trafficking groups affect a household’s behavior and state presence in the areas they control. Another strand of her research studies the role of state capacity to deter and improve service-delivery to reduce gender-based violence in Peru, India and Mozambique. In addition to this research, she has ongoing collaborative research projects in the Dominican Repub-lic, Guatemala, Colombia, Jordan and the US.

Mica Sviatschi joined Princeton University as an Assistant Professor of Economics in autumn 2018. She is also an affiliate at the African School of Economics and the Inter-national Crisis Group. Her PhD in Economics is from Columbia University. She also holds a BS in Economics and an MA in Economics from Universidad de San Andres, Buenos Aires.