This paper provides new evidence of sharp differences in cognitive development by socioeconomic status in early childhood for five Latin American countries using a common measure of receptive language ability. We find important differences in development in early childhood across countries and...

The impact of cash transfer programs on the accumulation of human capital is a topic of great policy importance. An attendant question is whether program effects are larger when transfers are"conditioned"on certain behaviors, such as a requirement that households enroll their children in school....

Infrastructure contributed 1.8 percentage points to Côte d'Ivoire's annual per capita GDP growth over the mid-2000s before conflict began to erase the country's infrastructure and its growth contributions. Raising the country's infrastructure endowment to the level of the region's middle-income...

Infrastructure contributed 0.6 percentage points to Ethiopia's annual per capita GDP growth over the last decade. Raising the country's infrastructure endowment to that of the region's middle-income countries could add an additional 3 percentage points to infrastructure's contribution to growth....

Infrastructure improvements contributed 0.6 percentage points to Zambia's annual per capital GDP growth over the past decade, mostly because of exponential growth in information and communication services. The power sector, by contrast, pulled the growth rate down by more than 0.1 percentage...

Infrastructure contributed just over one percentage point to Ghana's annual per capital GDP growth during the 2000s. Raising the country's infrastructure endowment to that of the region's middle-income countries could boost the annual growth rate by more than 2.7 percentage points. Ghana has an...

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) faces possibly the most daunting infrastructure challenge on the African continent. Conflict has seriously damaged most infrastructure networks. Vast geography, low population density, extensive forestlands, and criss-crossing rivers complicate the...

Infrastructure made a net contribution of around one percentage point to Nigeria's improved per capita growth performance in recent years, in spite of the fact that unreliable power supplies held growth back. Raising the country's infrastructure endowment to that of the region's middle-income...