This paper extends the concept of learning poverty to provide local-level estimates of the share of children at age 10 who can read and understand a simple text in Colombia. The learning poverty indicator combines the share of children who are out of school and thus schooling deprived with the...

Countries across Eastern Europe and Central Asia are in their third decade of independence. What impact does this have on the skills premium and does accession to the European Union have an impact on the returns to education. The returns to education in 28 transition and 20 non-transition...

This study uses the 2020 Census to explore the determinants of interstate migration in Mexico between 2015 and 2020 and the earnings gains from migration. The study analyzes both spatial characteristics (push and pull factors in the origin and destination states) and individual factors that...

Female innovators raise fewer resources from investors, even when their ventures are similar to those of all-male teams. Efforts to mitigate the disparities have typically focused on changing how founders seek investment. However, the causes of gender disparities are systemic: in uncertain...

Internet surveys may never replace in-person surveys as a gold standard, but they remain important tools for rapid, remote, and low-cost data collection. The West Bank and Gaza Poverty and Equity team had a unique opportunity to compare a Facebook survey with an in-person survey covering...

Mechanization has the potential to boost agricultural production and reduce poverty in rural economies, but its impacts remain poorly understood. This paper randomizes the subsidized provision of a pair of traction oxen among 2,546 farmers in Côte d’Ivoire through a matching grant. The...

This paper constructs cost-of-living indexes for different groups of households to quantify the differences in the distribution of the burden of high inflation among the populations of countries in Europe and Central Asia. The analysis demonstrates that the cost-of-living crisis of 2022-23 has...

This case study highlights the steps taken to advance gender equality, female empowerment, and capacity building by the Lilongwe Water Board, a statutory corporation with responsibility for water and sewerage services in Lilongwe City, Malawi. The Lilongwe Water Board provides water services to...

Despite growing awareness of the various limitations of electoral democracy, there is a relative lack of evidence on effective policy interventions to improve the performance of elected officials and motivate them to act more equitably. This paper reports the results from an experiment in which...

Sustainability-Linked Bonds - an innovative debt product that incorporates incentivized sustainability targets - are becoming increasingly popular to encourage issuers to improve their sustainability performance. However, existing Sustainability-Linked Bond structures allow issuers to weaken the...