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on Development |
| By: | José García-Montalvo; Marta Reynal-Querol; Juan Carlos Muñoz Mora |
| Abstract: | Recent research has shown the usefulness of nighttime light (NTL) data as a proxy for growth and economic activity. This paper explores the potential of using luminosity at night, recorded by satellite imagery, to construct measures of inequality. We develop a new methodology to construct a Gini index for each country using the nighttime light per capita over millions of small pixels. To assess the usefulness of our procedure, we check the correlation of our measure with the common factor extracted from the analysis of several Gini indices calculated using traditional data sources. Finally, we show two specific applications of our methodology: the calculation of within and between inequality across regions and ethnic groups. |
| Keywords: | Inequality, inequality between and within decomposition, nighttime light, development |
| JEL: | O10 |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1252&r= |
| By: | Bannor, Frank; Dikgang, Johane; Gelo, Dambala |
| Abstract: | It is expected that production in the agricultural sector will be significantly affected by climate change. Therefore, it is projected that countries with extreme climatic conditions will suffer a long-term decline in agricultural productivity beyond the short-term loss of production. Given the gross domestic product (GDP) value of agriculture in many sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries, the effects of climate change on agriculture are likely to permeate their economies. The long- and short-run effects of climate variability on agricultural total factor productivity (TFP) growth in 14 SSA countries are examined using panel data from 1995 to 2016. We employ a twofold approach. First, we use the Data Envelopment Approach (DEA) to calculate the Malmquist Index of Maize Productivity growth. Second, we apply a fully modified ordinary least square estimator and the Granger causality test in heterogeneous mixed panels to evaluate the long- and short-run impacts of climate variability on agricultural TFP development. The empirical results from the long-run analysis show that maize agricultural TFP is negatively associated with climate variability for only five countries. In the short run, our empirical estimation indicates no evidence of causality effect. To mitigate the negative long-run effects – and given that spending on R&D is found to produce negative effects in some of those five countries – policymakers should take immediate action to provide farmers with adequate and expeditious irrigation facilities, including the construction of dams to harvest and store rainfall water for future use. |
| Keywords: | total factor productivity; climate variability; data envelope approach; fully modified ordinary least square; heterogeneous mixed panel. |
| JEL: | Q1 Q16 Q18 Q54 |
| Date: | 2021–05–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:107590&r= |
| By: | Mauricio Gallardo (Universidad Católica del Norte); María Emma Santos (Universidad Nacional del Sur/CONICET); Pablo Villatoro (Economic Comision for Latin America and the Caribean); Vicky Pizarro (Universidad Católica del Norte) |
| Abstract: | Latin America is not the poorest region in the developing world. It is, however, a region with high inequality, precarious institutional frameworks and high exposition to covariate and idiosyncratic shocks. In this paper, with a sample of more than seven million observations, we perform estimates of vulnerability to multidimensional poverty for 17 Latin American countries at three points in time: 2005/6, 2012 and 2017. We use a multidimensional Bayesian network classifier model to estimate the conditional probability of being multidimensionally poor. We then use these probabilities and the standard downside semi-deviation as the risk parameter to identify the vul- nerable households. Our findings suggest that, despite significant reductions over the study period, in 2017, approximately 200 million people – about the size of the population of Brazil – continued living at high risk of be- coming poor or remaining multidimensionally poor. We also observe that vulnerability to poverty is reduced at a much slower rate than poverty itself, revealing that poverty reduction accomplishments can actually be quite frag- ile. Additionally, we perform a decomposition between poverty-induced and risk-induced vulnerability and find that as poverty decreases, risk-induced vulnerability becomes relatively more important than poverty-induced vulnerability. However, it is the poor-vulnerable group that still constitutes the core vulnerability group. |
| Keywords: | poverty vulnerability Bayesian networks Latin America |
| JEL: | I32 C55 D81 O54 O57 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aoz:wpaper:36&r= |
| By: | Nicolás Ajzenman (Sao Paulo School of Economics - FGV); Eleonora Bertoni (Inter-American Development Bank); Gregory Elacqua (Inter-American Development Bank); Luana Marotta (Inter-American Development Bank); Carolina Méndez Vargas (Inter-American Development Bank) |
| Abstract: | Inequality in access to high-quality teachers is an important driver of student socioeconomic achievement gaps. We experimentally evaluate a novel nation-wide low-cost government program aimed at reducing teacher sorting. Specifically, we tested two behavioral strategies designed to motivate teachers to apply to job vacancies in disadvantaged schools. These strategies consisted of an "Altruistic Identity" treatment arm, which primed teachers’ altruistic identity by making it more salient, and an “Extrinsic Incentives” arm, which simplified the information and increased the salience of an existing government monetary- incentive scheme rewarding teachers who work in underprivileged institutions. We show that both strategies are successful in triggering teacher candidates to apply to such vacancies, as well as make them more likely to be assigned to a final in-person evaluation in a disadvantaged school. The effect among high-performing teachers is larger, especially in the "Altruistic" arm. Our results imply that low-cost behavioral strategies can enhance the supply and quality of professionals willing to teach in high-need areas. |
| Keywords: | identity monetary incentives priming altruism prosocial behavior teacher sorting |
| JEL: | I24 D91 I25 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aoz:wpaper:45&r= |
| By: | Julia Schmieder |
| Abstract: | Based on findings from high-income countries, typically economists hypothesize that having more children unambiguously decreases the time mothers spend in the labor mar- ket. Few studies on lower-income countries, in which low household wealth, informal child care, and informal employment opportunities prevail, find mixed results. Using Mexican census data, I find a positive effect of an instrument-induced increase in fertility on maternal employment driven by an increase in informal work. The presence of grandparents and low wealth appear to be important. Econometric approaches that allow extrapolating from this complier-specific effect indicate that the response in informal employment is non-negative for the entire sample. |
| Keywords: | Fertility, Female Labor Supply, Middle-Income Countries, Informality |
| JEL: | J13 J16 J22 J46 |
| Date: | 2020 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:diw:diwwpp:dp13496&r= |
| By: | Alejandro J. Ganimian; Karthik Muralidharan; Christopher R. Walters |
| Abstract: | Despite growing interest in improving early-childhood education in developing countries, there is little evidence on cost-effective ways of doing so at scale. We use a large-scale randomized experiment to study the impact of adding an extra worker focused on pre-school education (for children aged 3-5) in the world’s largest public early-childhood program: India’s Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS). Adding a worker doubled net instructional time and led to 0.29 and 0.46 standard deviation increases in math and language test scores after 18 months for children who remained enrolled in the program. Rates of stunting and severe malnutrition were also lower in the treatment group, likely reflecting the effect of freeing up time of the incumbent worker to focus more on nutrition-related tasks. A cost-benefit analysis suggests that the benefits of the program are likely to significantly exceed its costs even under conservative assumptions. |
| JEL: | C93 I21 I22 I25 O15 |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:28780&r= |
| By: | Juan Segnana; José Joaquín Endara |
| Abstract: | This paper provides detailed evidence on the short-term economic effects of the large and localized Rohingya migratory shock on the Bangladeshi host population. The analysis shows the welfare impact of changes in prices of goods on the host community due to the large population influx. Rice prices are significantly higher short after the population shock started but this does not extend to other food items. Rice is a prevalent staple in the consumption bundle of hosts, rice inflation underlies a great deal of variations in welfare. We have evidence of distributional effects due to variation in relative prices. We register large price variations for the main items consumed by Rohingyas and hosts right after the influx began. Our results show an immediate and temporary welfare loss for the bottom quintile which was eliminated and reversed due to a large food aid provided by the World Food Program (WFP) together with highly integrated markets. We consider humanitarian food aid in contexts alike crucial as a smoothing mechanism of demand-pull inflation. |
| Keywords: | Consumption, Food aid, Forced migration, Forced displacement, Host communities, Prices, Rohingyas, Welfare |
| JEL: | D12 F22 O15 P46 R2 |
| Date: | 2020–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aep:anales:4410&r= |
| By: | Daniel Chachu |
| Abstract: | Developing countries that experience commodity booms struggle to mobilize sustainable tax revenues. Emerging literature on the subject notwithstanding, there is limited exploration of the specific types of institutions critical for improving fiscal capacity in resource-rich contexts. This paper investigates which types of institutions moderate the adverse effect of natural resource rents on non-resource tax effort. |
| Keywords: | resource rent, Tax revenue, Institutions, Sustainability, Democracy, Natural resources |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2021-75&r= |
| By: | Shapiro, Jacob N.; Vanden Eynde, Oliver |
| Abstract: | Can tax regimes shape the incentives to engage in armed conflict? Indian mining royaltiesbenefit the States, but are set by the central government. India's Maoist belt is mineral-rich, and States are responsible for counterinsurgency operations. We exploit the introduction of a 10% ad valoremvtax on iron ore that increased royalty collections of the affected states by a factor of 10. We find that the royalty hike was followed by a significant intensification of violence in districts with importantiron ore deposits. The royalty increase was also followed by an increase in illegal mining activity in iron mines. |
| Keywords: | Counterinsurgency, Civil Conflict, Natural Resources |
| Date: | 2021–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpm:docweb:2102&r= |
| By: | Aparajita Dasgupta (Ashoka University); Anisha Sharma (Ashoka University) |
| Abstract: | Bans on sex-selective abortions, typically implemented to make sex ratios more equitable, may have adverse welfare consequences in terms of increased gender discrimination against surviving ‘unwanted’ girls. Exploiting geographic and intertemporal variation in the implementation of a ban on sex-screening and sex-selection across different states in India, we examine the extent to which prenatal gender discrimination is substituted by postnatal discrimination after the enforcement of the ban. In particular, we study whether the ban on sex-selective abortions worsens relative health and mortality outcomes for girls as compared to boys. Using the observation that sex-selective abortions are more likely to occur among families with firstborn girls, we compare our treatment effects across families with firstborn girls and firstborn boys. Our findings indicate that the ban increased the gender gap in mortality, health outcomes and health investments through two main channels: an increase in the proportion of unwanted girls who face increased discrimination and an increase in fertility in intensively treated families with firstborn girls, leading to greater competition among siblings for resources. We contrast our results with the impact of a policy that, in addition to strengthening supply-side measures, also contains demand-side elements aimed at shifting social norms through a mass media gender sensitisation intervention. Our results suggest that demand-side interventions that directly target social norms reduce the adverse welfare consequences of pure supply-side restrictions. |
| Keywords: | sex selective abortion; missing women, PNDT, ultrasound, legal ban, son preference, gender discrimination, skewed sex ratio |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ash:wpaper:58&r= |
| By: | Baskaran, Thushyanthan (University of Siegen); Bhalotra, Sonia (University of Essex & University of Warwick); Min, Brian (University of Michigan, Ann Arbor); Uppal, Yogesh |
| Abstract: | There has been a phenomenal global increase in the proportion of women in politics in the last two decades, but there is no evidence of how this influences economic performance. We investigate this using data on competitive elections to India’s state assemblies, leveraging close elections to isolate causal effects. We find significantly higher growth in economic activity in constituencies that elect women and no evidence of negative spillovers to neighbouring male-led constituencies, consistent with net growth. Probing mechanisms, we find evidence consistent with women legislators being more efficacious, less corrupt and less vulnerable to political opportunism. |
| Keywords: | Political representation ; identity ; India ; gender ; women legislators ; economic growth ; luminosity ; corruption ; roads ; close elections ; electoral incentives JEL Classification: D72 ; D78 ; H44 ; H73 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wrk:warwec:1354&r= |
| By: | Singh, Tejendra Pratap; Visaria, Sujata |
| Abstract: | Recent work from developed parts of the world has documented a positive association between air pollution and criminal activity. We use high-frequency complaints and air pollution data to estimate air pollution’s causal effects on crime in a developing country. In order to establish causality, we exploit plausibly exogenous local variation in wind direction in an instrumental variable setup. We find that a lower number of complaints are received on the days of high air pollution levels. This effect is more pronounced for property crimes than for violent crimes. Our results are robust to a host of robustness checks and falsification checks. Exploring the potential mechanisms, we find that the decline in criminal activity might result from increased costs of indulging in criminal activity. |
| Date: | 2021–05–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:hs4xj&r= |
| By: | Hamory, Joan; Miguel, Edward; Walker, Michael; Kremer, Michael; Baird, Sarah |
| Abstract: | Estimating the impact of child health investments on adult living standards entails multiple methodological challenges, including the lack of experimental variation in health status, an inability to track individuals over time, and accurately measuring living standards and productivity in low-income settings. This study exploits a randomized school health intervention that provided deworming treatment to Kenyan children, and uses longitudinal data to estimate impacts on economic outcomes up to 20 y later. The effective respondent tracking rate was 84%. Individuals who received two to three additional years of childhood deworming experienced a 14% gain in consumption expenditures and 13% increase in hourly earnings. There are also shifts in sectors of residence and employment: treatment group individuals are 9% more likely to live in urban areas, and experience a 9% increase in nonagricultural work hours. Most effects are concentrated among males and older individuals. The observed consumption and earnings benefits, together with deworming's low cost when distributed at scale, imply that a conservative estimate of its annualized social internal rate of return is 37%, a high return by any standard. |
| Keywords: | Kenya, child health, deworming, long-run impacts |
| Date: | 2021–04–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cdl:econwp:qt1mv5691c&r= |
| By: | Gnangnon, Sèna Kimm |
| Abstract: | The international policy discourse, for example by the World Trade Organization and the United Nations, has emphasized the critical role of productive capacities in promoting sustainable development and building economic resilience in developing countries. This paper has examined whether development aid contributes to enhancing productive capacities in recipient countries. To that effect, it considers two main components of the total official development assistance (ODA), including Aid for Trade (AfT) and NonAfT, the latter being the part of total ODA allocated to other sectors than the trade-related sectors. The analysis relies on the index of the overall productive capacities developed recently by the UNCTAD, and covers 111 countries over the period 2002-2018. The findings indicate that development aid, including its two main components contribute to fostering productive capacities in recipient countries, with AfT flows exerting a higher positive effect on productive capacities than NonAfT flows. Moreover, in Least developed countries (LDCs), the positive effect of ODA on productive capacities reflects the key role of both AfT flows and NonAfT flows in contributing to the development of productive capacities. In contrast, in NonLDCs (other countries in the full sample than LDCs), only AfT flows matter positively for the strengthening of productive capacities, as NonAfT flows do not appear to exert a significant effect on productive capacities. These outcomes highlight the criticality of development aid for enhancing productive capacities in developing countries, in particular in LDCs. |
| Keywords: | Development aid,Productive Capacities |
| JEL: | D24 O1 F35 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esprep:233973&r= |
| By: | Siddhartha Bandyopadhyay (University of Birmingham); Sanjukta Sarkar (ICMR-National Institute of Medical Statistics); Rudra Sensarma (Indian Institute of Management Kozhikode) |
| Abstract: | We provide the first comprehensive analysis of the impact of three key household resources (water, sanitation and cooking fuel) on both non-partner violence (NPV) and intimate partner violence (IPV) experienced by women. We use data from a nationally representative household survey for India obtained from the latest (fourth) round of the National Family Health Survey conducted in 2015-16. We employ matching techniques (propensity score matching and inverse-probability-weighted regression adjustment) to control for selection bias in the estimation of the effects of household resources on IPV and NPV. Unlike previous work, we analyze the different categories of NPV (i.e. physical and sexual) and IPV (i.e. physical, sexual and emotional) separately, thereby isolating the effects on the different types of violence. We find that emotional IPV decreases with access to cooking fuel and toilets while sexual IPV decreases with provision of cooking fuel. Provision of all three key resources reduces physical NPV but there is no effect on sexual NPV. These results are found to be robust to selection on unobservables using the Rosenbaum bounds approach. |
| Keywords: | violence against women, non-partner violence, intimate partner violence, water, toilets, cooking fuel, matching methods |
| JEL: | I38 J12 C21 |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bir:birmec:21-09&r= |
| By: | Mohammad Reza Farzanegan |
| Abstract: | This study examines the causal joint effect of a new political regime and war against Iraq on life expectancy of Iranians for the period 1978–1988 during the revolution and war. I use a synthetic control approach to construct a synthetic Iran based on a weighted average of other Middle East and North Africa (‘MENA’) and Organization of the Petroleum Exporting (‘OPEC’) countries. The synthetic Iran matches the average level of key pre-revolution life expectancy correlates and the evolution of the factual Iranian life expectancy during the post-revolution period through the end of the war. I find a sizable negative effect of the joint treatment. The results show that in total, an average Iranian has lost an accumulated 62 years of life during the post-revolution period until the end of war with Iraq in 1988. The average annual years of life lost is approximately six years. In other words, in the absence of the revolution and war, an average Iranian’s life expectancy could be approximately six years longer. |
| Keywords: | synthetic control method, treatment effect, Iran, Iraq, war, conflict, revolution, life expectancy, health |
| JEL: | C23 H56 F51 D74 Q34 |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9063&r= |
| By: | Olivier Bargain; Maria C. Lo Bue |
| Abstract: | The present paper sheds new light on the growth implications of gender inequalities in the Moroccan labour market. We confront two different approaches. The first one is based on firm data to estimate gender complementarity in production and uses this information for simulations based on a simple macroeconomic model. The second relies on country panel variation to relate growth to the relative employment of women and, also, suggest simulations for Morocco. Both approaches lead to similar conclusions regarding the potential economic gains from increased female participation in this country. |
| Keywords: | Morocco, Female labour force participation, Gender gap, Employment, Growth, Production functions (Economic theory) |
| Date: | 2021 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unu:wpaper:wp-2021-79&r= |
| By: | Remy Levin (University of Connecticut); Daniela Vidart (University of Connecticut) |
| Abstract: | How do lifetime experiences of macroeconomic risk shape attitudes towards risk? We study this question theoretically and empirically for individuals in developing countries. We build a Bayesian model of choice in which agents’ risk attitude adapts to their evolving beliefs about background risk. Our model predicts that risk aversion will increase monotonically in the variance of the background risk, and will decrease convexly in the mean. We test the model by linking longitudinal surveys from Indonesia and Mexico, containing elicited measures of risk aversion for the same subjects years apart, with state-level real GDP growth time series capturing their lifetime macroeconomic experiences. In both countries measured risk aversion significantly increases in experienced growth volatility and significantly decreases in experienced mean growth. The effect of volatility is 0.9-4.3 times the effect of the mean, indicating that experiences of volatility are first-order drivers of risk attitudes. |
| Keywords: | Risk attitudes, experience effects, macroeconomic volatility, development |
| JEL: | D14 D81 D83 E32 G11 O11 O12 |
| Date: | 2021–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uct:uconnp:2021-09&r= |
| By: | Fernando Aragón (Simon Fraser University); Diego Restuccia (University of Toronto); Juan Pablo Rud (Royal Holloway, University of London/IFS) |
| Abstract: | This paper shows that the study of the farm size-productivity relationship hinges on the choice of productivity measure. Our main insight is that using yields, a partial measure of productivity commonly used in the literature, may not be informative. This occurs because, in addition to total factor productivity, yields pick up input markets distortions and deviations from constant returns to scale. We examine the empirical relevance of this insight using detailed microdata from Uganda. We find an inverse relationship between yields and farm size. We show the relationship turns positive when accounting for market distortions and returns to scale; or when using a farm- specific component of total factor productivity. |
| Keywords: | Farm size productivity yields land markets distortions agriculture policy |
| JEL: | O12 O13 Q12 Q15 |
| Date: | 2021–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aoz:wpaper:44&r= |