Rent-free housing consumption is routine in the cities of West Africa. In Kumasi, Ghana's second city, one-quarter of all households occupy free accommodation and the population so housed continues to rise as a result of supply constraints. In spite of its critical role, few definitive studies...

Since the fifteenth century when Europeans first established a credible presence in Ghana, colonial values have played a significant role in shaping lifestyles in the country. Despite these imported influences, the courtyard house remains the predominant house form in rural and urban areas...

Social protection measures are policy instruments that are widely used across a broad range of developing countries in pursuit of many different development objectives. In many cases social protection measures such as food or cash transfers were first introduced to ensure minimum levels of food...

One of the most difficult problems in the social sciences is measuring the policy climate in societies. Prior to the 1930s the vast majority of labor regulations in the U.S. were enacted at the state level. In this paper we develop several summary measures of labor regulation that document the...

Social protection measures are policy instruments that are widely used across a broad range of developing countries in pursuit of many different development objectives. In many cases social protection measures such as food or cash transfers were first introduced to ensure minimum levels of food...