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on Development |
| By: | Premand, Patrick; Rohner, Dominic Patrick |
| Abstract: | Conflict undermines development, while poverty, in turn, breeds conflict. Policy interventions such as cash transfers could lower engagement in conflict by raising poor households' welfare and productivity. However, cash transfers may also trigger appropriation or looting of cash or assets. The expansion of government programs may further attract attacks to undermine state legitimacy. To investigate the net effect across these forces, this paper studies the impact of cash transfers on conflict in Niger. The analysis relies on the large-scale randomization of a government-led cash transfer program among nearly 4, 000 villages over seven years, combined with geo-referenced conflict events that draw on media and nongovernmental organization reports from a wide variety of international and domestic sources. The findings show that cash transfers did not result in greater pacification but—if anything—triggered a short-term increase in conflict events, which were to a large extent driven by terrorist attacks by foreign rebel groups (such as Boko Haram) that could have incentives to “sabotage” successful government programs. |
| Date: | 2023–02–06 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10293 |
| By: | Kumar, Santosh (University of Notre Dame); Halliday, Timothy J. (University of Hawaii at Manoa); Mazumder, Bhash (University of California, Irvine) |
| Abstract: | We provide the first estimates of broad-based health transmission between parents and their young children in India. The correlations between maternal health and child health outcomes—such as anemia, stunting, and body mass index—are approximately 0.20. When aggregating these health measures into a general index of latent health, we estimate a correlation of 0.22, comparable to intergenerational persistence estimates in other countries. Absolute health mobility is lower for poorer households and for scheduled castes and scheduled tribes. We document significant geographic heterogeneity in health transmission, lower mobility in northern and central India, and higher mobility in the southern regions. Consistent with this pattern, states with higher poverty rates and higher anemia prevalence tend to exhibit lower upward mobility. |
| Keywords: | intergenerational mobility, anemia, stunting, latent health, nutrition, India |
| JEL: | I14 I15 O12 |
| Date: | 2025–02 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17684 |
| By: | Chakraborty, Kritika Sen; Villa, Kira M. |
| Abstract: | Rural households rely on several strategies to cope with weather variability, including school-work transitions of adolescents and changes in human capital investments. Using rich longitudinal data from rural South Africa linked with geospatial data on climate indicators, we examined the effect of rainfall realizations on the schooling and work decisions and education expenditures of adolescents and young adults. We exploited the exogenous within-individual variation in exposure to district-level rainfall realizations over age. Our results suggest that current and lagged growing season rainfall increases adolescent human capital investments on the intensive margin among both female and male adolescents. While current rainfall decreased labour market participation among adolescents in non-agricultural households, current rainfall increased female labour supply in agricultural households. We also found that previous-period rainfall positively affected work propensity among all male adolescents. Our results documented schooling and labour supply adjustments among adolescents in agricultural and non-agricultural households, in response to rainfall fluctuations. |
| Date: | 2024–08–22 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aer:wpaper:695939e4-0327-4bc9-9ced-2ac00c57dad0 |
| By: | Eigbiremolen, Godstime O.; Orji, Anthony |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the household wealthhigher education attendance relationship and the evidence on credit constraints in post-secondary schooling. Using unique longitudinal data that link household wealth and measures of cognitive ability age 12 years to higher education attendance at age 1922 years, we differentiated short-term credit constraints from long-term credit constraints and directly tested the relative importance of short and long-term credit constraints in schooling decision. We found that both short-term and long-term credit constraints determine the household wealthhigher education attendance relationship. Therefore, we recommend complementing short-term policies like financial aid with long-term interventions that empower households to continue to invest in human capital development over the childs life cycle, which will crystalize in higher cognitive ability and readiness for higher education. |
| Date: | 2024–08–22 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aer:wpaper:320a3a06-d397-4c66-9333-53725f8ec499 |
| By: | García, Jorge Luis (Texas A&M University) |
| Abstract: | I investigate the intra-household labor and resource allocation consequences of an employment guarantee targeting rural households in India. The guarantee insures household earnings, replacing women as added workers and shutting down a motive for saving. Despite sizable program-job take-up, the guarantee decreases participation in other working activities, and, thus, the labor force participation of married women and total time worked by their husbands. The guarantee accounts for up to 30% of a recent countrywide decrease in rural female labor force participation. Though it increases household consumption, the guarantee reduces the command of household earnings by women, and, thereby, their wellbeing. |
| Keywords: | added-worker effect, family insurance, female labor force participation, guaranteed employment, intra-household bargaining power, poverty |
| JEL: | I31 I32 J12 J13 O12 O15 |
| Date: | 2025–02 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp17689 |
| By: | Kinuthia, Bethuel Kinyanjui |
| Abstract: | This study investigates the determinants of GVCs participation among manufacturing firms in Kenya. Using the propensity matching method and firm-level cross-sectional data from the World Bank Enterprise Survey (WBES) for the period 20072018, the analysis identifies key determinants across the entire manufacturing sector. These determinants are labour productivity, foreign ownership, firm size, website presence, generator use, and transport costs. Additional factors depend on the specific GVC definition applied. The study also reveals that smaller and female owned firms are more susceptible to business environment factors such as security, corruption, and competition with the informal sector compared to larger and male owned counterparts. Furthermore, the study examines factors that influence GVCs participation in the food and chemical sectors, highlighting sector-specific factors which can result in tailored policy recommendations. |
| Date: | 2024–11–27 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aer:wpaper:206048e4-8485-44a6-9635-bd8b798d8e2b |
| By: | Osabuohien, Evans S.; Karakara, Alhassan Abdul-Wakeel; Edafe, Oluwatosin D. |
| Abstract: | Global value chains (GVC) have become an important developmental issue. However, empirical studies on the peculiar nature of the GVC participation of firms are sparse, especially in West Africa. Thus, this study empirically examines the factors that constitute the major drivers of firm GVC participation and the institutional obstacles to firm GVC participation. The study discusses how such factors could be surmounted. We use the logit model as the empirical strategy and the World Bank's Enterprise Survey (ES) database for two biggest West African countries: Ghana and Nigeria. The findings show that firms in West Africa face constraints that militate against their participation in GVC. Also, we find crucial factors that can influence firms participation in GVC, which differ relatively between Ghana and Nigeria. In essence, medium and large-scale firms have higher likelihood to participate in GVC than small-scale firms. Similarly, the legal status of the firm helps in enhancing the firms participation in GVC, as firms that are shareholding or partnership firms are more likely to participate in GVC than sole proprietorship firms. Also, firm location serves as an advantage to the firm GVC participation, as firms in cities with a human population of over one million are more likely to be engaged in GVC. The finding of the study is relevant to industry players and firms, particularly on the mode of participation in GVC and in helping policy makers in creating a favourable policy ambience for GVC participation of firms, which could enhance corporate relations among domestic firms and international players to spur firms productivity and participation in GVC. |
| Date: | 2024–11–27 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aer:wpaper:f3859c4f-97c5-4116-b6c8-12fcdac38779 |
| By: | Yelwa, Mohammed; Anyanwu, Sarah O. |
| Abstract: | The study examined child development and family human capital investment decisions in Nigeria. The study focused on household per capita income and family structure using the Nigeria living standard survey for 2018/2019 for the secondary data analysis and a field survey conducted by the researchers in six states in each of the geopolitical zones in Nigeria for the primary data analysis. The study was anchored on household utility maximization theory using the ordinary least squares (OLS) method to analyse the secondary data. Four different results were obtained. First, the result of findings from the OLS estimate revealed that per capita income had no significant impact on Family Human Capital Investment Decisions (FHCID) and male perception of the cost of education had a significant positive impact on FHCID. On the contrary, multi-dimensional poverty index and female perception of the cost of education had an inverse significant impact on FHCID. The second result revealed that average household size, family residence from 1 to 30 minutes proximity to school and 31 minutes and above proximity to school had no significant impact on FHCID. Dependency ratio showed an inverse significant impact on FHCID and family literacy level showed a significant positive impact on FHCID. The third result from the binary logistics regression showed that age, occupation and place of residence of the household head had no significant impact on FHCID. Gender (female-headed household) and education showed an inverse significant impact on FHCID. However, household head years in business or paid employment showed a positive impact on FHCID. The fourth result from the binary logistics regression revealed that marital status had no significant impact on FHCID; family size had a significant negative impact on FHCID; and family structure (type of parents) and number of girl child in the household had a direct impact on FHCID. This study showed complementarities in the home utility function, such that the marginal product of investments rises as family living standards rise. These findings highlight lifetime inequalities and necessitates a special focus on treatments for low-income households. Understanding human capital development and how diverse elements interact is critical to combating poverty and its intergenerational transmission. As a result, this study made several recommendations. First, the importance of persistent action by the government and other donor agencies such as the United Nation Childrens Fund (UNICEF) and The World Bank to address the problems of income inequality and pervasive poverty ravaging Nigerias economy. The study strongly recommends that family, especially parents, maintain justice and fairness within the home, to foster constructive, sympathetic and peaceful home, encouraging most children to exhibit excellent academic performance. Third, government agencies and hospitals, especially in rural areas, intensify family planning and birth control campaign to help reduce household size. Fourth, children of the poor be given opportunities for paid employment, to enhance their performance in the school. Fifth, children from poor homes be provided with access to scholarships, free instructional materials and books. Sixth, government and its agencies on education intensify sensitization and campaign for families to embrace Western education, especially in the northern region, promote compulsory primary basic education for all children and prosecute parents of out-of-school children or child labour to serve as a deterrent to others. Finally, the study recommends that non-governmental and religious organizations preach peace and tolerance within the family for the well-being and human capital development of their wards. |
| Date: | 2024–08–22 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aer:wpaper:41e815b9-8e3d-481c-90e5-9e3c536a14df |
| By: | Viollaz, Mariana; Vasconcellos Archer Duque, Daniel; Diaz-Bonilla, Carolina; Newhouse, David Locke; Weber, Michael |
| Abstract: | This study combines pre-COVID-19 household surveys with 2020 macro data to simulate changes in household economic welfare and poverty rates through job losses, labor income changes, and non-labor (remittance) income changes during 2020 in Brazil, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, South Africa, and Türkiye. It first presents an in-depth analysis of employment elasticities projections—a critical input in microsimulations—for 15 developing countries. In 11 of the 15 countries, employment estimates for 2020 based on elasticities were within 5 percent of the actual employment level, but in four countries, where the labor markets were more disrupted by the pandemic, the projections considerably underestimated job losses due to the crisis. The study then presents the simulation results for the five countries, which show declines in per capita household income or consumption across the distribution, a decline in the middle class, and increased poverty, but no other clear pattern of impacts across the different quintiles. Finally, data from Brazil indicate that the simulation underestimated the magnitude of the shock throughout the distribution, especially for the wealthy, because it underestimated declines in earnings. |
| Date: | 2023–02–13 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10304 |
| By: | Danon, Alice Madeleine; Das, Jishnu; De Barros, Andreas; Filmer, Deon P. |
| Abstract: | This paper assesses the reliability and validity of cognitive and socioemotional skills measures and investigates the correlation between schooling, skills acquisition, and labor earnings. The primary data from Pakistan incorporates two innovations related to measurement and sampling. On measurement, the paper develops and implements a battery of instruments intended to capture cognitive and socioemotional skills among young adults. On sampling, the paper uses a panel that follows respondents from their original rural locations in 2003 to their residences in 2018, a period over which 38 percent of the respondents left their native villages. In terms of their validity and reliability, our skills measures compare favorably to previous measurement attempts in low- and middle-income countries. The following are documented in the data: (a) more years of schooling are correlated with higher cognitive and socioemotional skills; (b) labor earnings are correlated with cognitive and socioemotional skills as well as years of schooling; and (c) the earnings-skills correlations depend on respondents’ migration status. The magnitudes of the correlations between schooling and skills on the one hand and earnings and skills on the other are consistent with a widespread concern that such skills are underproduced in the schooling system. |
| Date: | 2023–02–15 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10309 |
| By: | Bussolo, Maurizio; Dixit, Akshay Govind; Golla, Anne Marie; Kotia, Ananya; Lee, Jean Nahrae; Sharma, Siddharth |
| Abstract: | Understanding how e-commerce platforms are affecting the small, informal firms that sell on them is a question of growing importance to researchers and policy makers in developing countries. This paper examines this question using data from surveys of firms selling on two e-commerce platforms in South Asia. The businesses selling on these platforms range widely in terms of size, degree of formalization, and other characteristics. However, these firms -- even the micro and small ones, which tend to be informal -- are from a selected group, being owned and managed by individuals who are more educated and younger than the owners and managers of more typical firms in this setting. The sellers' main reason for joining the platforms is to access more customers. Most of the sellers report an expansion of their business after joining the platforms. They also report an increase in their incentive to register their business and their visibility to tax authorities. Other, less widespread channels of impact reported by the firms include the adoption of new or improved business practices and technologies, better access to finance, and greater flexibility in balancing home and work life. In general, these reported impacts do not vary significantly by firm size or degree of formalization, suggesting that even informal, small firms that have (selectively) joined e-commerce platforms can benefit from the greater market access facilitated by the platforms. Finally, given size and age, firms that have been selling on the platform for a longer period are more likely to experience these impacts, suggesting that firms learn how to use the platform more effectively over time. |
| Date: | 2023–02–14 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10306 |
| By: | Njikam, Ousmanou; Elomo, Therese Zogo |
| Abstract: | We investigate whether multinational enterprises (MNEs) create high quality jobs than domestic firms in least-developed countries. We argue that the quality of jobs offered by MNEs may differ depending on their two alternative entry modes, that is, greenfields (GRFs) versus joint ventures (JVs). Using 2005-2017 firm-level Cameroonian data, we find that relative to local firms, MNEs offer more secure jobs through lower speeds and greater half-lives of employment adjustment as well as lower elasticity of employment, and they also offer high-wage jobs. GRFs and JVs also offer more secure jobs than local firms, but through different mechanisms, i.e., employment adjustment processes for the former and wage elasticity for the latter, and their generous wage policies differ across skill groups and occupations. In contrast, skill-intensive MNEs and namely GRFs employ less unskilled workers while skill-intensive JVs enhance managerial and technical occupations. We also find that capital-intensive JVs have a significantly positive impact on both non-production and production employment and generate less jobs in managerial and technical occupations. These results hold for the intensity of foreign ownership and firm exit. |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aer:wpaper:fd1d1549-cd45-4420-95de-f3de4d0570cb |
| By: | Wollburg, Philip Randolph; Hallegatte, Stephane; Mahler, Daniel Gerszon |
| Abstract: | Previous studies have explored potential conflicts between ending poverty and limiting global warming, by focusing on the carbon emissions of the world’s poorest. This paper instead focuses on economic growth as the driver of poverty alleviation and estimates the emissions associated with the growth needed to eradicate poverty. With this framing, eradicating poverty requires not only increasing the consumption of poor people, but also the consumption of non-poor people in poor countries. Even in this more pessimistic framing, the global emissions increase associated with eradicating extreme poverty is small, at 2.37 gigatonnes of equivalent carbon dioxide in 2050, or 4.9 percent of 2019 global emissions. These additional emissions would not materially affect the global climate change challenge: global emissions would need to be reduced by 2.08 gigatonnes of equivalent carbon dioxide per year, instead of the 2.0 gigatonnes of equivalent carbon dioxide per year needed in the absence of any extreme poverty eradication. Lower inequality, higher energy efficiency, and decarbonization of energy can significantly ease this trade-off: assuming the best historical performance in all countries, the additional emissions for poverty eradication are reduced by 90 percent. Therefore, the need to eradicate extreme poverty cannot be used as a justification for reducing the world’s climate ambitions. When trade-offs exist, the eradication of extreme poverty can be prioritized with negligible emissions implications. The estimated emissions of eradicating poverty are 15.3 percent of 2019 emissions with the lower-middle-income poverty line at $3.65 per day and or 45.7 percent of 2019 emissions with the $6.85 upper-middle-income poverty line. The challenge to align the world’s development and climate objectives is not in reconciling extreme poverty alleviation with climate objectives but in providing middle-income standards of living in a sustainable manner. |
| Date: | 2023–02–24 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10318 |
| By: | Brunckhorst, Ben James; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Hill, Ruth; Kim, Yeon Soo; Kugler, Maurice David |
| Abstract: | This paper examines the welfare impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, using harmonized data from 343 high-frequency phone surveys conducted in 80 economies during 2020 and 2021, representing more than 2.5 billion people. The analysis focuses on the scarring effects of the initial losses of employment and income by examining their evolution over time across and within countries, as restrictions on mobility and economic activity were introduced and then gradually relaxed. The employment and welfare outcomes of some groups that were impacted to a greater degree initially—including women, informal workers, and those with less education—have been improving at a slower pace. The social protection response in lower-income economies was largely insufficient to protect households from the pandemic shock. Unmitigated welfare losses, as seen for example from the large share of households indicating income losses well into 2021, are highly correlated with food insecurity, which likely led some households to sell physical assets and deplete their savings. Without proper remediation, the uneven welfare impacts associated with COVID-19 may be amplified over the medium to long term, leading to future increases in poverty and inequality. |
| Date: | 2023–02–07 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:wbk:wbrwps:10300 |