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on Nudge and Boosting |
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Issue of 2026–11–09
two papers chosen by Marco Novarese, Università degli Studi del Piemonte Orientale |
| By: | Gallo, Misty; Wolf, Patrick J.; Patrinos, Harry A. |
| Abstract: | Government programs often experience low take-up, limiting their potential positive impact. We examine whether reducing registration frictions can increase participation in a state-financed literacy intervention program. In a randomized field experiment, families received either encouragement and a simplified enrollment process, or these interventions plus text message nudges, relative to a business-as-usual control group. We find that encouragement and simplified registration increased take-up by more than 10 percentage points, while a fuller treatment of encouragement, simplified enrollment, and text nudges increased take-up by 6 percentage points. We also estimate the impact of these treatments to promote use of funding and amount of funding used to access tutoring. We find positive intent-to-treat effects with the fuller treatment showing a strong impact on use and amount of funding used. These low-cost interventions offer a promising strategy for increasing participation in government programs. |
| Keywords: | Literacy, Tutoring, Take-up, Nudge, Behavioral economics, Encouragement, Regulatory friction, Parental engagement, Choice, Implementation |
| JEL: | I21 D91 C93 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:1836 |
| By: | Alex Chan; Ayush Gupta; Yetong Xu |
| Abstract: | Cadaveric organ shortages leave thousands without life-saving transplants each year. Countries differ in using opt-in (informed consent) or opt-out (presumed con sent) systems for donor registration. Using newly assembled cross-country panel data and an event-study design, this paper shows that presumed-consent laws are associated with increased organ donation only when strictly enforced and fam ily veto power is limited; weak opt-out regimes show negligible or even negative changes. A theoretical signaling model provides a plausible mechanism that de termines when opt-in or opt-out yields more donations, emphasizing the roles of donation propensity, signaling costs, and the family’s ability to overturn defaults. A large laboratory experiment further tests this mechanism, showing that opt-in generally produces equal or higher donation rates unless signaling is costly and family veto power is minimal. The results underscore that defaults alone rarely increase donations unless paired with strong institutional enforcement. |
| Keywords: | Defaults, Nudge, Organ Transplantation, Market Design, Donation, Healthcare, Giving, Behavioral Economics |
| JEL: | C92 D64 D47 H00 I11 I18 |
| Date: | 2026–11 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2025_792 |