Abstract
Empirical evidence indicates a strong relationship between financial development and economic growth. Accordingly, bank credit is one of the main variables to be considered. Meanwhile, in a large country like Brazil, there are municipalities that do not have bank agencies and therefore have no access to bank credit. Credit unions act as alternative institutions in providing credit, with features that are distinct from banks in that they assume the risk of their applications for the community, promoting local development through the formation of savings and microcredit initiatives aimed at local business. This paper provides a brief history of cooperatives in Brazil and measures the impact of credit unions on the income of municipalities using the differences in difference method. The results showed an average impact of R$ 1,825 in GDP per capita for a sample of 3,580 Brazilian municipalities, with a 5% significance level.
Keywords:
Cooperatives; Credit; Growth; Differences in difference; GDP
