Tiago Ferraz

We have a new version of this paper that highlights the IO aspects of religious change.

Check it out: github.com/tiagopferraz...

Hoje a @folha.com publica artigo em que comentamos os achados dessa pesquisa. Em poucas palavras, o lado da oferta, geralmente pouco estudado, importa muito.

t.co/OlFHTgCvQe

Vai ser ótimo ter um feedback seu, quando vc puder, claro.

@renagamine.bsky.social, demorou mas saiu 😂

In short, migration transformed Brazil’s cities, and Evangelical churches were uniquely positioned to respond. This wasn’t just about belief! It was about market adaptation.

You can check the paper here: github.com/tiagopferraz...

Feel free to contact us and talk about it!

🟣 To explain the observed Evangelical rise via income alone, wages would’ve had to fall between 60% and 80%, which is unlikely.
🟢 But a 20% increase in Evangelical temples, holding income fixed, is sufficient to replicate the observed shift in Evangelical affiliation.

To unpack the contribution of each mechanism, we have a structural model of religious choice, which suggests that the supply-side response was the main driver of migration-induced Evangelical growth. Our counterfactual exercises show that:

The difference comes down to institutional flexibility.
Evangelical churches usually have lower fixed costs and decentralized leadership, while the Catholic Church is more centralized and capital-intensive, requiring long priest training and dedicated buildings.

Why? Two main mechanisms:
🔸 Demand-side: migration reduced local wages, especially among informal workers, making Evangelical churches, known for community support, more attractive.
🔸 Supply-side: Evangelical churches rapidly expanded in response to growing urban populations.

We find:
✅ Migration led to a decline in Catholic affiliation while simultaneously leading to an increase in Evangelical affiliation
✅ It explains ~23% of the rise in Evangelicalism over the period

We use exogenous variation in migration flows driven by international commodity price shocks to isolate the impact from other confounding factors and alleviate concerns about migrants' self-selection. We then ask: how did it affect the people already living in destination cities?

A popular explanation for this? Migration. Millions of people moved to urban centers where Evangelical churches were emerging. But was migration the cause of this religious transformation? And if so, how?

Between 1980 and 2010, Brazil saw one of the most striking religious shifts in the world:

- Catholic affiliation fell from ~90% to ~65%.
- Evangelical affiliation more than tripled.

This reshaped politics, identity, and community life.

🚨New working paper 🚨

How did migration reshape Brazil’s religious landscape?
Raphael Corbi, Fabio Miessi, and I have a new paper showing that internal migration drove a major religious shift by transforming local religious markets instead of converting migrants or spreading beliefs. 👇

Congrats!!

Our own @hannahritchie.bsky.social did a video last year with Big Think called “What the news won't tell you about climate change” — and it just won gold at the 2025 Telly Awards as the best non-broadcast video on sustainability!

Thank you!

Valeu Edu!

Valeu Leo!

Valeu Rodrigo!

Thank you Michael!

If this topic interests you, I encourage you to check the paper:

github.com/tiagopferraz...

Additionally, our work relates to a recent paper by
@gulyssea.bsky.social and Clément Imbert, which shows that workers transition from informal to formal jobs over the long run, driven by increased formal firms and job opportunities. (9/n)

In our research, we show that incoming migration results in a reduction in formal employment that closely matches the increase in informality and decreases in total compensation in the formal sector (earnings and non-wage benefits) and the earnings of informal workers. (8/n)

...of the effects of labor supply shocks on native workers, particularly in the formal sector. For instance, studies by Kleemans & Magruder (2018) and El-Badaoui et al. (2017) find that immigration increases informality and reduces earnings among native informal workers. (7/n)

...in the Semiarid region and existing migrant networks to forecast the number of incoming workers at their destinations. Much of the current empirical literature overlooks other adjustment margins beyond unemployment or wages, which can lead to an underestimation... (6/n)

...and informal labor, this competition may also lead to reduced compensation for formal workers, whether through earnings or non-wage benefits. To accurately identify these impacts, we rely on a shift-share IV, using weather shocks in the municipalities of origin... (5/n)

...to use both formal and informal labor in their production processes. Our model predicts that competition from incoming migrants can decrease earnings for native workers in the informal sector. Additionally, depending on the elasticities of substitution between formal... (4/n)

As established by Harris and Todaro (1970) and Fields (1975), incoming migration can lead to higher unemployment or informality in urban areas. We extend these models by incorporating non-wage benefits into the compensation packages for formal workers and allowing firms... (3/n)

We examine the impact of a supply shock of low-educated workers on local labor markets in Brazil from 1996 to 2010. Like many developing countries, Brazil has a dual-sector economy where formal and informal sectors coexist. (2/n)