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on Development |
| By: | Karthik Muralidharan; Venkatesh Sundararaman |
| Abstract: | We present experimental evidence on the impact of a school choice program in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh (AP) that featured a unique two-stage lottery-based allocation of school vouchers that created both a student-level and a market-level experiment. This design allows us to study both the individual and the aggregate effects of school choice (including spillovers). We find that private-school teachers have lower levels of formal education and training than public-school teachers, and are paid much lower salaries. On the other hand, private schools have a longer school day, a longer school year, smaller class sizes, lower teacher absence, higher teaching activity, and better school hygiene. After two and four years of the program, we find no difference between the test scores of lottery winners and losers on math and Telugu (native language). However, private schools spend significantly less instructional time on these subjects, and use the extra time to teach more English, Science, Social Studies, and Hindi. Averaged across all subjects, lottery winners score 0.13σ higher, and students who attend private schools score 0.23σ higher. We find no evidence of spillovers on public-school students who do not apply for the voucher, or on students who start out in private schools to begin with, suggesting that the program had no adverse effects on these groups. Finally, the mean cost per student in the private schools in our sample is less than a third of the cost in public schools. Our results suggest that private schools in this setting deliver (slightly) better test score gains than their public counterparts, and do so at substantially lower costs per student. More generally, our results highlight that ignoring heterogeneity among schools' instructional programs and patterns of time use may lead to incorrect inference on the impact of school choice on learning outcomes. |
| JEL: | C93 H44 H52 I21 O15 |
| Date: | 2013–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:19441&r=dev |
| By: | Ruiz, Claudia |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the effects of expanding access to credit on the decisions and welfare of households. It focuses on the entry of Banco Azteca, the first bank in Mexico targeting households from the informal sector. Panel data suggest that informal households in municipalities with Banco Azteca branches experienced several changes in their saving, credit and consumption patterns. In order to estimate the impact of Azteca's entry, the paper develops a dynamic model of household choices in which the bank is endogenously selecting the municipalities for branch openings. The analysis finds that in municipalities in which the bank entered, households were better able to smooth their consumption and accumulate more durable goods even though the overall proportion of households that save went down by 6.6 percent. These results suggest that the use of savings as a buffer on income fluctuations declines once formal credit is available. What is more, these effects vary across households. Among informal households, those who never receive formal job offers have the highest decline in saving rates. The model is also used to evaluate a legislation to cap interest rates levied by formal credit institutions. Simulations suggest that if the Mexican government were to cap the interest rate of Azteca at the rate for traditional banks, Azteca would stop operating in the poorest and least populated municipalities. |
| Keywords: | Access to Finance,Banks&Banking Reform,Small Area Estimation Poverty Mapping,Economic Theory&Research,Debt Markets |
| Date: | 2013–10–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6634&r=dev |
| By: | Dasgupta, Susmita; Martin, Paul; Samad, Hussain A. |
| Abstract: | Household air pollution is the second leading cause of disease in Madagascar, where more than 99 percent of households rely on solid biomass, such as charcoal, wood, and crop waste, as the main cooking fuel. Only a limited number of studies have looked at the emissions and health consequences of cook stoves in Africa. This paper summarizes an initiative to monitor household air pollution in two towns in Madagascar, with a stratified sample of 154 and 184 households. Concentrations of fine particulate matter and carbon monoxide in each kitchen were monitored three times using UCB Particle Monitors and GasBadge Pro Single Gas Monitors. The average concentrations of both pollutants significantly exceeded World Health Organization guidelines for indoor exposure. A fixed-effect panel regression analysis was conducted to investigate the effects of various factors, including fuel (charcoal, wood, and ethanol), stove (traditional and improved ethanol), kitchen size, ventilation, building materials, and ambient environment. Judging by its effect on fine particulate matter and carbon monoxide, ethanol is significantly cleaner than biomass fuels and, for both pollutants, a larger kitchen significantly improves the quality of household air. Compared with traditional charcoal stoves, improved charcoal stoves were found to have no significant impact on air quality, but the improved wood stove with a chimney was effective in reducing concentrations of carbon monoxide in the kitchen, as was ventilation. |
| Keywords: | Renewable Energy,Climate Change Mitigation and Green House Gases,Energy Production and Transportation,Energy and Poverty Alleviation,Health Monitoring&Evaluation |
| Date: | 2013–09–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6627&r=dev |
| By: | Cogneau, Denis; Mesple-Somps, Sandrine; Spielvogel, Gilles |
| Abstract: | Regression discontinuity designs applied to a set of household surveys from the 1980-90s allow to examine whether Cote d'Ivoire's aggregate wealth was translated at the borders of neighboring countries. At the border of Ghana and at the end of the 1980s, large discontinuities are detected for consumption, child stunting, and access to electricity and safe water. Border discontinuities in consumption can be explained by differences in cash crop policies (cocoa and coffee). When these policies converged in the 1990s, the only differences that persisted were those in rural facilities. In the North, cash crop (cotton) income again made a difference for consumption and nutrition (the case of Mali). On the one hand, large differences in welfare can hold at the borders dividing African countries despite their assumed porosity. On the other hand, border discontinuities seem to reflect the impact of reversible public policies rather than intangible institutional traits. |
| Keywords: | Economic Theory&Research,Regional Economic Development,Climate Change Economics,Emerging Markets,Population Policies |
| Date: | 2013–09–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6626&r=dev |
| By: | Klapper, Leora; Richmond, Christine; Tran, Trang |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates the impact of political instability and civil conflict on firms. It studies the unrest in Cote d'Ivoire that began in 2000, using a census of all registered firms for the years 1998-2003. The analysis uses structural estimates of the production function and exploits spatial variations in conflict intensity to derive the cost of conflict on firms in terms of productivity loss. The results indicate that the conflict led to an average 16-23 percent drop in firm total factor productivity and the decline is 5-10 percentage points larger for firms that are owned by or employing foreigners. These results are consistent with anecdotal evidence of increasing violent attacks and looting of foreigners and their businesses during the conflict. The results suggest increases in operating costs is a possible channel driving this impact. Finally, the paper investigates whether firms responded by hiring fewer foreign workers and finds evidence supporting this hypothesis. |
| Keywords: | Economic Theory&Research,Labor Policies,Microfinance,E-Business,Post Conflict Reconstruction |
| Date: | 2013–10–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:6640&r=dev |
| By: | Akter, Sonia; Mallick, Bishawjit |
| Abstract: | This paper presents an empirical investigation of socio-economic resilience to natural disasters of a tropical cyclone-prone coastal community in Bangladesh. It applies the state-and-transition model, a widely used applied ecology model, to (1) assess the current state of socio-economic resilience to tropical cyclone, (2) identify its drivers and (3) examine its nexus with poverty and socio-economic vulnerability. The results of this study can be summarized into three key findings. First, tropical cyclones had significant negative medium-run impacts on coastal residents’ lives and livelihoods, particularly in terms of income, employment and access to clean water and sanitation. Second, the loss of productive assets, human capital shock, credit constraint and proximity to the forest reserve were the key factors explaining resilience heterogeneity across households. Finally, although the poor were the most vulnerable and suffered from relatively higher economic, physical and structural damage, they exhibited relatively better ability to cope and recover from the shock compared to the non-poor. These findings imply that the increased risk of tropical cyclone is likely to reduce income and standards of living among the tropical coastal communities. However, the burden of these adverse impacts is unlikely to be disproportionally borne by the poorer segment of the society. |
| Keywords: | State-and-transition model, socio-economic vulnerability, socio-economic resilience, natural disasters, tropical cyclone, Bangladesh |
| JEL: | O12 O13 Q54 Q56 |
| Date: | 2013–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:50375&r=dev |
| By: | Scott Fulford (Boston College) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the changing distribution of where women and girls live in India at the smallest scale possible: India's nearly 600,000 villages. The village level variation in the proportion female is far larger than the variation across districts. Decomposing the variance, I show that village India is becoming more homogeneous in its preferences for boys even as that preference becomes more pronounced. A consequence is that 70% of girls grow up in villages where they are the distinct minority. Most Indian women move on marriage, yet marriage migration has almost no gender equalizing influence. Further, by linking all villages across censuses, I show that most changes in village infrastructure are not related to changes in child gender. Gaining primary schools and increases in female literacy decrease the proportion of girls. The results suggests that there are no easy policy solutions for addressing the increasing masculinization of Indian society. |
| Keywords: | Marriage migration; Sex ratios; Son preference; Geographic distribution of women; Asia; India |
| JEL: | O15 J12 J16 |
| Date: | 2013–09–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:boc:bocoec:833&r=dev |