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on Development |
| By: | Lucas Chancel (PSE - Paris School of Economics, WIL - World Inequality Lab); Denis Cogneau (IRD - Institut de Recherche pour le Développement, PSE - Paris School of Economics, PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS Paris - École normale supérieure - Paris - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Amory Gethin; Alix Myczkowski |
| Abstract: | This paper makes a first attempt to estimate the evolution of income inequality in Africa from 1990 to 2017 by combining surveys, tax data and national accounts in a systematic manner. The low quality of the raw data calls for a lot of caution. Results suggest that income inequality in Africa is very high, and stands at par with Latin America or India in that respect. Southern and Central Africa are particularly unequal. The bulk of continent-wide income inequality comes from the within country component, and the between country component was even slightly reduced in the two last decades, due to higher growth in poorer countries. Inequality was rather stable over the period, with the exception of Southern Africa. Dualism between agriculture and other sectors and mining rents seem to be important determinants of inequality. |
| Keywords: | Africa,Inequalities,Income inequality,Distributional National Accounts,DINA |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wilwps:hal-02876986&r=all |
| By: | David Pérez-Mesa (University of La Laguna); Gustavo A. Marrero (University of La Laguna); Sara Darias-Curvo (University of La Laguna) |
| Abstract: | For 33 Sub-Saharan countries, we use comparable household surveys to estimate child health inequality and the part of inequality caused by factors (circumstances) such as family background, the mother socio-demographic and anthropometric factors, household structure, household facilities and the region of residence. We perform this analysis for children below 5 years old, paying special attention to inequality differences by cohorts: from 0-1 up to 4-5 years old. Our measure of child health is the standardized height-for-age z-score corrected by the age (in months) and gender. We show that child health inequality is systematically lesser for the cohort of 4-5 years old than for the younger cohorts, and we do not find evidences that this result is caused by a mortality-selection bias. However, the aforementioned set of circumstances is impeding a further reduction in child health inequality. Indeed, health inequality caused by these factors (its ratio with respect to total inequality) has risen along the age distribution in more than 80% of the countries analyzed. We show that family background, followed by the household facilities and the place of residence of the child, contribute to explaining this evolution of child health in SSA along the age distribution. |
| Keywords: | Child health inequality, family background, child age distribution, Sub-Saharan Africa. |
| JEL: | I14 I15 O10 P52 |
| Date: | 2020–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:inq:inqwps:ecineq2020-557&r=all |
| By: | Anaka Aiyar (Department of Economics, University of Nevada, Reno); Joseph Cummins (Department of Economics, University of California Riverside) |
| Abstract: | We provide an empirical perspective and two classes of regression models that make progress on differentiating between two types of determinants of child health: health endowment effects provided to the child at birth; and health investment effects determined by the post-birth stream of health inputs provided to the child and the productivity of those investments. We apply the framework to two existing puzzles in the child health demography literature: the apparent lack of strong correlation between economic growth and child height-for-age z-score (HAZ); and the Indian Enigma, where Indian children are on average less tall than similarly economically situated African children. In the context of the Indian Enigma, we find that the Indian-African child HAZ gap (between 0.4sd and 0.5sd) is present immediately after birth and maintains a similar magnitude across the first three years of life. We interpret this as evidence that causes affecting health endowments likely explain the greater part of the Indian Enigma. We also estimate a robust association between a 10% increase in (ln) GDP per capita and a 0.04sd increase in child height by age 2. However, this correlation is not present at birth and is instead driven by differences in child growth rates. We interpret these results as indicating that differences in the post-birth health input stream, and/or the biological productivity of those inputs, likely explain the greater part of the economic growth association. |
| Keywords: | human capital; demographic and health surveys; child anthropometrics; multi-level modeling |
| JEL: | I15 J13 |
| Date: | 2020–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ucr:wpaper:202019&r=all |
| By: | Martin RUDASINGWA |
| Abstract: | Sub-Saharan African countries have been experiencing a persistently high level of inequality in access to healthcare services. Following the global call to eliminate health inequalities worldwide, different investments in health policies towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC) have been made in many Sub-Saharan African countries. However, evidence on the distributional incidence of health spending on these recent UHC-specific reforms is still limited. This paper aimed to close this gap in knowledge by conducting a quasi-longitudinal benefit incidence analysis to assess equality of both public and overall health spending on curative health services across socioeconomic groups in three Sub-Saharan African countries: Burkina Faso, Malawi and Zambia. The study relied on healthcare utilization data derived from different nation-level household surveys (including Living Condition and Monitoring Survey, Performance based Financing Survey, and Zambia Household Health and Expenditure Survey) and health expenditure data derived from National Health Accounts. The findings demonstrated increasing equality in the distributional incidence of health spending over time, but also considerable persistent heterogeneity across provinces/regions/district. Less health financing inequality was observed in Malawi than in the other two country. These findings suggest that the implementation of UHC-specific reforms was effective in increasing equality in the distributional incidence of health spending, meaning that more financial resources reached the poorest segments of society, but was not yet sufficient to remove differences across provinces/regions/districts. Further research is needed to investigate sources of heterogeneity within countries and identify strategies to overcome it. |
| Keywords: | Afrique, Burkina Faso, Zambie |
| JEL: | Q |
| Date: | 2020–08–19 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:avg:wpaper:en11365&r=all |
| By: | Elías Cisnerosy; Krisztina Kis-Katosz; Nunung Nuryartono |
| Abstract: | This paper studies the interactions between political and economic incentives to foster forest conversion in Indonesian districts. Using a district–level panel data set from 2001 to 2016, we analyze variation in remotely sensed forest loss and forest fires as well as measures of land use licensing. We link these outcomes to economic incentives to expand oil palm cultivation areas as well as political incentives arising before idiosyncratically–timed local mayoral elections. Empirical results documentsubstantial increases in deforestation and forest fires in the year prior to local elections.Additionally, oil palm plays a crucial role in driving deforestation dynamics. Variations in global market prices of palm oil are closely linked to deforestation inareas which are geo-climatically best suited for growing oil palm and they amplify the importance of the political cycle. We thus find clear evidence for economic and political incentives reinforcing each other as drivers of forest loss and land conversion for oil palm cultivation. |
| JEL: | O13 Q15 Q56 P16 |
| Date: | 2020–07 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rza:wpaper:825&r=all |
| By: | Léo Czajka (PSE - Paris School of Economics, WIL - World Inequality Lab) |
| Abstract: | Data on income/consumption distributions in Sub-Saharan Africa have been mainly used to study the welfare of the poorest. Yet, the rapid growth experienced by several countries in the last decades has drawn the attention towards higher earnings groups in the income/consumption distributions. However, due to under-reporting and non-response, surveys often fail to accurately measure the income of the wealthiest. Little is known about the size of such biases as it requires to have access to more reliable sources of information. In this paper we confront the 2014-2015 household survey with first-hand income tax files in the case of Côte d'Ivoire, 2014. We first identify, within the survey, a sub-sample corresponding to the one for which we have fiscal data. Comparing the earning distribution of this sub-sample with the one extrapolated from the fiscal data, we are able to measure the magnitude and the distribution of the bias among top earners in the survey. We then use this estimation to adjust the pre-tax and pre-transfer income distribution of the entire survey sample and thus recover corrected nationally representative inequality statistics. Our results show that the 2014-2015 survey significantly underestimates income inequalities. After our correction, the top 1 % share increases from 11.57 % to 17.15 %, the top 10 % share from 40.34 % to 48.28 %, and the Gini coefficient from 0.53 to 0.59. We compare our estimates with more commonly used consumption inequality measures and discuss the potential sources of differences. Making the assumption that the bias is constant over time for a given level of income, we also extend our correction to previous surveys. After correction, top 1 % shares increase by 5-6 percentage points, top 10 % shares by 7-8 percentage points and Gini coefficients increase by 6 points, making Côte d'Ivoire's inequality levels comparable to that of the US. |
| Keywords: | fiscal data,distribution,Income Inequality,Cote d'Ivoire,top income,survey data,World Inequality Lab |
| Date: | 2020–05–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wilwps:halshs-02659230&r=all |
| By: | Raul Bajo Buenestado (University of Navarra) |
| Abstract: | A number of countries in Sub-Saharan Africa have recently deployed billions of dollars to improve their electricity infrastructure. However, aggregate data shows that the relative number of households with an electricity connection at home has barely increased. In this paper we study the role of blackouts to partially explain why there have been relatively few additional households with electricity access despite the increase in electrification expenditure. Using geo-localized survey data from Kenya, we find that households that live in neighborhoods in which power outages are relatively more frequent are (at least) about 6%-9% less likely to have electricity at home. We also find that households that have electricity access but which experience frequent power outages are also less likely to purchase electrical appliances. |
| Keywords: | Energy poverty, Electricity access, Electrification rates, Sub-Saharan Africa |
| JEL: | L94 O13 Q41 Q48 |
| Date: | 2020–04–24 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:una:unccee:wp0220&r=all |
| By: | Dambala Gelo |
| Abstract: | As the result of prohibitively high transaction costs, smallholder farmers are only partly integrated into agricultural and forest commodity markets, a situation that may leave them in a lower level of development equilibrium (i.e., a poverty trap). For the most part, many users of forest commons extract forest products, typically non-timber products, for subsistence use or safety net purposes. To overcome this problem, in recent years, collective vertical integration (VI) of forest product marketing cooperative structures have been promoted and, in some cases, adopted by users of forest commons. Although this type of program has been observed to raise smallholder incomes, there is little evidence available on saving/investment responses to such income gains. This paper investigates precautionary saving and investment responses to collective forest product marketing programs among users of forest commons in Ethiopian villages. To identify the causal effects of the program, I applied propensity score matching, difference-in-difference (DID) and change-in-change (CIC) estimators to household survey data collected from randomly selected households in the Gimbo district (south-western Ethiopia). I find strong evidence that participation in the program reduces savings in the form of livestock holdings and that effect is limited to non-poor households. When interpreted in terms of the Permanent Income Hypothesis (PIH), the results imply that participants felt the current income gains to be non-transient, which led to reduced precautionary savings and to a gain in consumption/welfare. Moreover, I found that the program has spurred investment in child education and participation in off-farm self-employment. These results point to the importance of the safety net/insurance channel of the program. Overall, the findings underscore the program’s potential to raise the standard of living via ancillary mechanisms beyond directly raising income outcome. |
| Keywords: | Forest commons, vertical integration, transaction cost, treatment effects, precautionary saving. |
| JEL: | D02 D23 D14 Q |
| Date: | 2020–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rza:wpaper:828&r=all |
| By: | Cueto, Santiago; León, Juan (Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE)); Felipe, Claudia |
| Abstract: | In this paper the authors utilize the five rounds of Young Lives household surveys across four countries (Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam) to study the characteristics of children who had dropped out of school by 22 years of age. While most children in the longitudinal sample go to primary school, they tend to drop out more often and earlier in Ethiopia. In India most children complete the early grades of school but drop out later, particularly in grades 11 and 13. Researchers find that in all countries, except Vietnam, there is a considerable number of children who drop out of school but at some point return to it, either to complete secondary or drop out again. The reasons provided by children for dropping out across the countries are oftentimes related to poverty: for example, the need to work, or care or provide for family. The multivariate analysis shows that indeed in many cases the wealth level of the family at an early age predicts later dropout, as does maternal education level, students’ early skills and residence in certain regions of each country. There are also some variations across countries; for example, boys are more likely to drop out of school in Ethiopia and Vietnam, and children who have repeated a grade are more likely to drop out of school in Peru. However, having high educational aspirations at early ages seems to be a protective factor against dropping out. This suggests that the value that children place on education may be an important preventative factor against dropping out. Overall, these results suggest the need to act early through education and social protection interventions to target young children who are at risk of dropping out, and the follow their trajectories, providing support as needed to specific groups and even individuals, so that all children may fulfill their right to complete at least secondary education. |
| Keywords: | Dropping out, Student drop out, Deserción escolar, Comparative analysis, Análisis comparativo, Young Lives, Niños del Milenio, Ethiopia India, Vietnam, Etiopia, Vietnan, Perú, Peru |
| JEL: | I20 I21 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gad:doctra:dt109&r=all |
| By: | Rajesh Raj Natarajan; Simone Schotte; Kunal Sen |
| Abstract: | The Indian labour market is characterized by a high level of informality, with large numbers of workers in poorly paid 'lower-tier' informal jobs, and somewhat better paid 'upper-tier' informal jobs, which do not have the same benefits and security of tenure as formal jobs. We examine the likelihood of individuals moving up from informal jobs to formal jobs (and vice versa) and from lower-tier to upper-tier informal jobs using a longitudinal dataset for India. We find that self-employed workers exhibit relatively more mobility than wage workers. |
| Keywords: | Formal and informal, informal, formal, lower tier, upper tier, work status, India |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2020-101&r=all |
| By: | Rishabh Kumar (CSUSB - California State University [San Bernardino]) |
| Abstract: | This article is about the metamorphoses of aggregate Indian wealth over fifteen politically transformative decades. Based on a comprehensive new database, I find that wealth-income ratios have fluctuated by large margins in the twentieth century. In emerging India of the twenty first century, wealth is steadily approaching the same disproportionate size (relative to national income) that was seen during sharp economic downturns in interwar colonial India. The long run 1939-2012 U shaped trajectories of wealth-income ratios are reasonably explained by a mid century asset price slowdown and the return of high land shares in national wealth. These results corroborate the secular increase of wealth-income ratios in most large economies since the 1980s. The manifestation of this phenomena appears to be independent of the stage of development. |
| Keywords: | wealth-income ratios,India,Economic growth,Wealth-Income ratio,National wealth,Inequality,Land values |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wilwps:hal-02876998&r=all |
| By: | Evans,David K.; Yuan,Fei; Filmer,Deon P. |
| Abstract: | Pay levels for public sector workers?and especially teachers?are a constant source of controversy. In many countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, protests and strikes suggest that pay is low, while simple comparisons to average national income per capita suggest that it is high. This study presents data on teacher pay from 15 African countries, along with five comparator countries from other regions. The results suggest that in several (seven) countries, teachers'monthly salaries are lower than other formal sector workers with comparable levels of education and experience. However, in all of those countries, teachers report working significantly fewer hours than other workers, so that their hourly wage is higher. Teachers who report fewer hours are no more likely to report holding a second job, although teachers overall are nearly two times more likely to hold a second job than other workers. With higher national incomes, the absolute value of teacher salaries rises, but they fall as a percentage of income per capita. The study explores variation across types of teacher contracts, the association between teacher pay and student performance, and the association between teacher pay premia and other aspects of economies. |
| Keywords: | Educational Sciences,Labor Markets,Secondary Education,Effective Schools and Teachers,Educational Institutions&Facilities |
| Date: | 2020–08–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:9358&r=all |
| By: | Ata Can Bertay; Ljubica Dordevic; Can Sever |
| Abstract: | We study whether higher gender equality facilitates economic growth by enabling better allocation of a valuable resource: female labor. By allocating female labor to its more productive use, we hypothesize that reducing gender inequality should disproportionately benefit industries with typically higher female share in their employment relative to other industries. Specifically, we exploit within-country variation across industries to test whether those that typically employ more women grow relatively faster in countries with ex-ante lower gender inequality. The test allows us to identify the causal effect of gender inequality on industry growth in value-added and labor productivity. Our findings show that gender inequality affects real economic outcomes. |
| Date: | 2020–07–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:imf:imfwpa:20/119&r=all |
| By: | Johannesson, Louise (Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)); Kyvik Nordås, Hildegunn (Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, Norway,) |
| Abstract: | Standing at 24% in 2018, India’s female labour force participation is only half of the global average (48%). At the same time, India has one of the widest gender wage gaps in the world and women are less likely to be employed in the formal sector compared to men. This study focuses on the role of international trade as a source of increased competitive pressure in domestic markets, and how it affects relative wages and formal employment between men and women. Using the Revealed Symmetrical Comparative Advantage index, sectors of comparative advantage and disadvantage are identified and matched on Indian labour force surveys that contain information on sectoral employment and earnings. We find that sectors of comparative advantage in services have the lowest gender wage gap, with women earning 24% less than their male counterpart, while women in manufacturing earned on average 40% less than male workers. The Oaxaca-Blinder decomposition shows that the total gender wage gap in sectors of comparative advantage in services are minor while it is quite substantial in manufacturing, regardless of the comparative advantage. The study concludes that trade goes hand in hand with a smaller gender wage gap in the services sectors as it allows women to leverage their skills better than in manufacturing. |
| Keywords: | Gender; International trade; Jobs; Earnings |
| JEL: | F14 F16 |
| Date: | 2020–08–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1348&r=all |
| By: | Adam, Antonis; Tsarsitalidou, Sofia |
| Abstract: | In this paper we try to explore the relationship between the World Bank’s international development assistance (IDA) and domestic conflict. As IDA is distributed only to countries that fall below an (ad hoc) income threshold, we employ a (fuzzy) regression discontinuity approach to estimate the causal effect of IDA on conflict. Our results suggest that IDA leads to a decrease in minor conflict events, such as anti-government demonstrations and riots and in an increase in major conflict events like assassinations of political leaders and revolutions. Moreover, IDA is associated with an increase in coup attempts and autocratic regime transitions. These results suggest that foreign aid may “win the hearts and minds of the population”, by increasing popular support for the government, and at the same time increase conflict over lootable aid rents. |
| Keywords: | Foreign aid, conflict, regression discontinuity |
| JEL: | D74 F35 O11 |
| Date: | 2020–06–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:101841&r=all |
| By: | Aslihan Arslan; Kristin Floress; Christine Lamanna; Leslie Lipper; Solomon Asfaw; Todd Rosenstock |
| Abstract: | Understanding the determinants of improved agricultural technology adoption is an important component of increasing agricultural productivity and incomes of smallholders to reduce poverty and hunger. In this paper, particular attention is given to the identification and promotion of productivity and resilience enhancing agricultural practices. Although numerous seminal reviews of this literature have been published, most of these were theoretical or conceptual reviews and focus on earlier literature from continents other than Africa, which is the continent facing the biggest productivity challenge now. The authors synthesize the findings of this literature with a focus on Africa using a meta-data set that brings together the results of 168 recently published papers. They find that most of this literature focuses on agronomic practices and that agroforestry and livestock related studies make up less than one fifth of the total published papers. Eleven determinants, primarily those related to information access, wealth indicators and tenure security, are found to increase adoption more than chance would dictate in the literature. The findings provide evidence to support recommendations for future policy and research. |
| Keywords: | Agricultural and Food Policy |
| Date: | 2020–08–26 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:unadrs:304758&r=all |
| By: | Martin Gassebner; Paul Schaudt; Melvin H. L. Wong |
| Abstract: | This paper studies how an increase in the number of armed groups operating within an area affects the amount of organized political violence. We use plausible exogenous variation in the number of armed groups in Pakistan, by exploiting the split of a major group due to the natural death of its leader. Employing difference-in-difference and instrumental variable regressions on geocoded incident and fatality data allows us to derive a causal effect: more groups lead to more political violence. By combining different data sources and implementing a new approach to deal with potential double-counting, we provide a proxy for counter-insurgency efforts by the government. We show that the increase in violence is primarily driven by the armed groups and not by responses of the government. |
| Keywords: | political violence, conflict, terrorism, armed groups, double-counting |
| JEL: | D74 F52 H56 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_8372&r=all |
| By: | Aroop Chatterjee (WITS - University of the Witwatersrand [Johannesburg]); Léo Czajka (UCL - Université catholique de Lille); Amory Gethin (WIL - World Inequality Lab , PSE - Paris School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | This paper estimates the distribution of personal wealth in South Africa by com- bining tax microdata covering the universe of income tax returns, household surveys and macroeconomic balance sheets statistics. We systematically compare estimates of the wealth distribution obtained by direct measurement of net worth, rescaling of reported wealth to balance sheets totals, and capitalisation of income flows. We document major inconsistencies between available data sources, in particular re- garding the measurement of dividends, corporate assets and wealth held through trusts. Both household surveys and tax data remain insufficient to properly capture capital incomes. Notwithstanding a significant degree of uncertainty, our findings reveal unparalleled levels of wealth concentration. The top 10 per cent own 86 per cent of aggregate wealth and the top 0.1 per cent close to one third. The top 0.01 per cent of the distribution (3,500 individuals) concentrate 15 per cent of household net worth, more than the bottom 90 per cent as a whole. Such high levels of inequality can be accounted for in all forms of assets at the top end, including housing, pen- sion funds and other financial assets. Our series show no sign of decreasing wealth inequality since apartheid: if anything, we find that inequality has remained broadly stable and has even slightly increased within top wealth groups. |
| Keywords: | Distribution,Wealth,South Africa,inequality,welfare state |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wilwps:hal-02876974&r=all |
| By: | Elsayed, Ahmed (IZA); Marie, Olivier (Erasmus University Rotterdam) |
| Abstract: | Exploiting a unique policy reform in Egypt that reduced the number of years of compulsory schooling, we show how it unexpectedly increased education attainment as more students chose to complete the next school stage. This impact is almost entirely driven by girls from more disadvantaged households. Treated women later experienced important positive improvements in labor market opportunity and marriage quality, as measured by bride price received and household bargaining power. We attribute the increased investment in daughters' human capital to changes in the behavior of credit-constrained families facing reduced school costs combined with strongly non-linear returns to female education. |
| Keywords: | school costs, education investment, gender bias, female labor market, marriage, bride price, Egypt |
| JEL: | I21 I25 J24 O55 |
| Date: | 2020–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13402&r=all |
| By: | Liyousew BORGA |
| Abstract: | What are the effects of social protection programs in reducing within-household inequality? Evidence from three large scale programs shows that program participation induces reallocation of resources.An analysis of the allocation of total resources within families shows that resources are not shared equally with men consuming a larger share of resources as measured by a private assignable good. Program participation, however, induces some reallocation of resources from parents to children. However, targeting poor households by anti-poverty programs cannot guarantee reaching poor individuals. Our results show that irrespective of program participation, children in our sample faced similar probability of being undernourished at any point of the percapita expenditure distribution”. |
| Keywords: | Éthiopie, Pérou, Inde |
| JEL: | Q |
| Date: | 2020–08–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:avg:wpaper:en11354&r=all |
| By: | Julia Fonseca; Bernardus Van Doornik |
| Abstract: | We estimate the effect of an increase in the availability of bank credit on the employment and the earnings of high- and low-skilled workers. To do so, we consider a bankruptcy reform that increased the legal protections of secured creditors, which led to an expansion of bank credit to Brazilian firms. We use detailed administrative data and an empirical strategy that compares changes in outcomes for financially constrained firms, which were affected by the bankruptcy reform, with unconstrained firms, which were largely unaffected by the reform. Following the bankruptcy reform and subsequent expansion in credit, constrained firms increased employment, especially of high-skilled workers. We also observe an increase in wages, with gains concentrated on skilled workers and on workers who were employed at constrained firms prior to the reform. To rationalize these findings, we design a model in which heterogeneous producers face constraints in their ability to borrow and have production functions featuring capital-skill complementarity. Using this framework, we estimate that the reallocation of resources induced by the bankruptcy reform accounts for 36 percent of the observed increase in aggregate productivity in Brazil during the 2000s. |
| Date: | 2020–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bcb:wpaper:532&r=all |
| By: | Abedullah (Chief of Research, Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Islamabad.); Muhammad Tanvir (Pakistan Institute of Development Economics, Islamabad.) |
| Abstract: | About 3 billion people are relying on polluting sources of energy in developing countries. These polluting sources are responsible for 4 million deaths and 2.7 percent of the global burden of disease. Ninety-four percent of households in rural areas of Pakistan are using solid biomass for cooking and heating. Being mainly involved in cooking, rural women are highly vulnerable to hazardous pollutants. The extant literature has rarely explored the impact of indoor air pollution on women health in Pakistan. The present study unveils the effect of polluting fuel burning on symptoms of acute upper respiratory infections such as sore throat, cough, congestion, breathing difficulties, and fatigue. A household survey was conducted by employing a multi-stage sampling technique to collect data from 252 households from Abbottabad and Haripur districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. The diversification in domestic tasks, number of windows in kitchen and use of mask in close kitchen have negative and significant correlation with respiratory health symptoms. However, solid fuels, exposure to pollution, and close kitchen are found to have positive and significant impacts on respiratory health symptoms. The results of standardized regression model reveal that use of polluting energy sources in close kitchen are contributing more than twice to respiratory symptoms than in open kitchen. Exposure to pollution, solid fuels and close kitchen are major culprits for respiratory health symptoms among rural women responsible for kitchen work. The study concludes that awareness campaigns on the benefits of using clean energy sources, importance of windows and masks in close kitchen and open kitchen among rural women may help to significantly reduce the burden of respiratory health problems. |
| Keywords: | Indoor air pollution, polluting fuel and respiratory symptoms, Pakistan |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pid:wpaper:2020:12&r=all |