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on Central and Western Asia |
| By: | K. SUNDARAM (Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics, Delhi, India) |
| Abstract: | Analysing the Unit Record Data from the NSS 55th and 61st Round Employment-Unemployment Surveys, the Organized Sector Workforce in non-agriculture is shown to be larger than the corresponding DGE&T estimates by 16.5 million in 2004-05 and to have increased by 5.4 million between 2000 and 2005 instead of the 1.6 decrease indicated by the corresponding DGE&T estimates. Examining some features of employment contracts of the regular wage/salary workers who account for 88 percent of the organized sector workforce, it is shown that between 14 to 27 million of the 41.5 million workers in organized non-agriculture are perhaps better labeled as Informal Workers who are without access to a set of social security benefits though they are located in the formal sector. Also presented are our estimates of workforce in the unorganized segment of non-agriculture in the country as a whole as also those in urban India who constitute the Urban Informal Sector. An analysis of labour productivity in the organized-unorganized segments of broad industry groups for 1999-2000 and 2004-05 is followed by an examination of differences across the organized-unorganized divide in average daily earnings and in the poverty status of adult workers in non-agricultural activities for 2004-05 |
| Keywords: | Employment in organized sector, Urban Informal Sector, Labour Productivity, Wage Differentials, Poverty status of workers. |
| JEL: | I32 J21 J31 |
| Date: | 2008–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cde:cdewps:165&r=cwa |
| By: | Duflo, Esther; Hanna, Rema; Ryan, Stephen |
| Abstract: | This paper combines a randomized experiment and a structural model to test whether monitoring and financial incentives can reduce teacher absence and increase learning. In 57 schools in India, randomly chosen out of 113, a teacher’s daily attendance was verified through photographs with time and date stamps, and his salary was made a non-linear function of his attendance. The teacher absence rate changed from 42 percent in the comparison schools to 21 percent in the treatment schools. To separate the effects of the monitoring and the financial incentives, we estimate a structural dynamic labour supply model that allows for heterogeneity in preferences and auto-correlation of external shocks. The teacher response was almost entirely due to the financial incentives. The estimated elasticity of labour with respect to the incentive is 0.306. Our model accurately predicts teacher attendance in two out-of-sample tests on the comparison group and a treatment group that received different financial incentives. The program improved child learning: test scores in the treatment schools were 0.17 standard deviations higher than in the comparison schools. |
| Keywords: | education; financial incentives; India |
| JEL: | I20 I21 J13 J30 O10 |
| Date: | 2008–02 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6682&r=cwa |
| By: | Rodrik, Dani |
| Abstract: | The focus of policy reform in developing countries has moved from getting prices right to getting institutions right, and accordingly countries are increasingly being advised to move towards "best-practice" institutions. This paper argues that appropriate institutions for developing countries are instead "second-best" institutions - those that take into account context-specific market and government failures that cannot be removed in short order. Such institutions will often diverge greatly from best practice. The argument is illustrated using examples from four areas: contract enforcement, entrepreneurship, trade openness, and macroeconomic stability. |
| Keywords: | economic development; governance |
| JEL: | O1 |
| Date: | 2008–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6764&r=cwa |
| By: | Marijke Verpoorten |
| Abstract: | Farmers in developing countries are confronted with imperfect markets. This has an impact on their production activities. When implementing developing projects these market imperfections should be taken into account. This paper is an attempt to discuss the impact of imperfect markets in the context of an irrigation project in village Pata, Senegal. The first section models the production decision of the agricultural household. The second section presents the irrigation project in Pata. The third section tests for the presence of imperfections in the credit and labour markets of Pata. I conclude by discussing the implications for the project. |
| Date: | 2008–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ete:ceswps:ces0120&r=cwa |
| By: | Buiter, Willem H |
| Abstract: | The paper reviews the arguments for and against monetary union among the six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council - the United Arab Emirates, the State of Bahrain, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Sultanate of Oman, the State of Qatar and the State of Kuwait. Both technical economic arguments and political economy considerations are discussed I conclude that there is an economic case for GCC monetary union, but that it is not overwhelming. The lack of economic integration among the GCC members is striking. Without anything approaching the free movement of goods, services, capital and persons among the six GCC member countries, the case for monetary union is mainly based on the small size of all GCC members other than Saudi Arabia, and their high degree of openness. Indeed, even without the creation of a monetary union, there could be significant advantages to all GCC members, from both an economic and a security perspective, from greater economic integration, through the creation of a true common market for goods, services, capital and labour, and from deeper political integration. The political arguments against monetary union at this juncture appear overwhelming, however. The absence of effective supranational political institutions encompassing the six GCC members means that there could be no effective political accountability of the GCC central bank. The surrender of political sovereignty inherent in joining a monetary union would therefore not be perceived as legitimate by an increasingly politically sophisticated citizenry. I believe that monetary union among the GCC members will occur only as part of a broad and broadly-based movement towards far-reaching political integration. And there is little evidence of that as yet. |
| Keywords: | convergence; currency union; exchange rate regime; GCC |
| JEL: | E42 E52 E63 F33 F42 |
| Date: | 2008–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:6639&r=cwa |