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on Microfinance |
| By: | Francis Annan; Belinda Archibong |
| Abstract: | Mental health disorders account for a significant share of the overall global disease burden. The economic losses from such disorders are staggeringly large, particularly in low-income countries, where people are faced with several unexpected shocks. We test whether improved communication can mitigate such mental health disorders. Partnering with a major telecommunications company, we implement low-cost communication interventions that provide mobile calling credits to a nationally representative set of low-income adults in Ghana during the COVID-19 pandemic. Individuals’ inability to make unexpected calls, need to borrow SOS airtime, and to seek digital loans decreased significantly relative to a control group. As a result, the programs led to a significant decrease in mental distress (-9.8%), the likelihood of severe mental distress by -2.3 percentage points (a quarter of the mean prevalence), and domestic violence, with null impact on consumption expenditure. The effects are stronger for monthly mobile credits than a lump-sum. We present evidence that improvements in both business-related services and social inclusion and/or protection are relevant explanations. Simple cost-benefit analysis shows that providing communication credit to low-income adults is a cost-effective policy for improving mental health. Communication – the ability to stay connected – meaningfully improves mental well-being and interventions about communication are particularly valuable when implemented as many installments. |
| JEL: | I12 I15 I38 L63 O12 |
| Date: | 2023–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:31638&r=mfd |
| By: | Pejman Abedifar (University of St Andrews; Khatam University); Hossein Doustali (Khatam University); Steven Ongena (University of Zurich; Swiss Finance Institute; KU Leuven; NTNU Business School; Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR)) |
| Abstract: | What is the role played by marketplace lending after natural disasters? Analyzing a sample of more than one and a half million observations from Lending Club around the 33 worst natural disasters that occurred between 2013 and 2017, we find that there is an increase in the demand for marketplace loans by almost 10%. Yet, the platform does not restrict lending to individuals in the affected areas, nor do we observe an increase in interest rates. Interestingly, the performance of borrowers who receive loans after a natural disaster is not significantly different from the borrowers during normal times, indicating that the platform is competent at efficiently meeting the extra loan demand. |
| Keywords: | Marketplace Lending, FinTech, Natural Disasters, Access to Finance, Credit Risk Assessment |
| JEL: | D14 E51 G2 Q54 |
| Date: | 2023–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:chf:rpseri:rp2378&r=mfd |
| By: | Sachiko HATA; Yasuo SUGIYAMA |
| Abstract: | This research explores how entrepreneurs deploy defense mechanisms when facing the potential misappropriation of their own resources by established corporate partner “sharks.” The prior literature has examined legal and timing defenses, along with social defenses that utilize the network structure of investment relationships with power imbalances between young firms and large firms. By conducting qualitative analysis based on 41 semi-structured interviews with entrepreneurs' firms, broader and more detailed defense strategies were identified, including seven (invisible) defense mechanisms, such as “balanced coopetition, ” “eliminate information asymmetry, ” “agile implementation of ideas, ” which were not immediately identifiable as defense mechanisms." |
| Keywords: | Microcredit; Open Innovation, Startup, Entrepreneurs, Qualitative research, Defense mechanism |
| JEL: | M10 M13 M21 |
| Date: | 2023–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kue:epaper:e-23-001&r=mfd |
| By: | Ichiroh DAITOH; Hiroaki SASAKI |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates how population decline may affect the optimal path in two types of Ramsey-Cass- Koopmans (RCK) model with child rearing costs. An optimal path exists in both models under economically plausible conditions and a new type of optimal path exists in the model where the discount rate is only the time preference rate. Under population decline, the existence and properties of an optimal path depend on the range of the rates of population change, regardless of the child rearing costs. First, when population decline is mild, the optimal path is a saddle-point path converging to a finite steady state, as in the standard RCK model with increasing population. Second, when population decline is faster, the optimal path is a saddle-point path converging, by reversible investment, to a finite steady state (i.e., a balanced growth path (BGP)), at which per capita consumption is larger than per capita income. Third, when population decline is even faster, the optimal path can be an asymptotically BGP, along which both per capita consumption and income keep increasing permanently. We show empirical relevance of these optimal paths by Japanese data and World Population Prospects 2019. |
| Keywords: | Microcredit; Population decline; dynamic optimization; long-run per capita growth; child rearing cost |
| JEL: | E21 J11 O11 O41 |
| Date: | 2023–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:kue:epaper:e-23-002&r=mfd |