How does supporting early clean technologies affect the long-run transition away from dirty technologies? Early policy action generates immediate environmental benefits from increased adoption of available efficient products, but may result in intertemporal substitution away from later products...

We study how consumers trade off digital versus in-person banking services and how consumer demand impacts bank technology choices. We use the COVID-19 pandemic as a laboratory, where pandemic risk raised the cost of in-person bank services. After the cost of in-person banking rises, customers,...

The electricity crisis in Pakistan is triggering grid power outage (load shedding) for many decades, which has not only affected the commercial and industrial sectors but also the domestic sector, specifically the livelihood of rural areas of the country. However, the extant literature advocates...

I survey some recent research on the role of patents in encouraging innovation and growth in developing economies, beginning with a brief history of international patent systems and facts about the current use of patents around the world. I discuss research on the implications of patents for...

We estimate the spatial spillover effects of a program to promote savings groups in Uganda and Malawi. We use geolocation data from a cluster-randomized experiment to compare the outcomes of households in areas where a high proportion of nearby villages were randomly assigned to treatment to...

In order to mitigate climate change in an accelerated time frame, more research is needed to understand how to achieve effective large-scale diffusion of low-carbon innovations. The conceptualization of sectoral socio-technical system transitions requires extending beyond an economic and...