While government spending on pro-poor community asset creation and income-transfers could have compounding positive effects on poverty reduction, it is important to first study trends in the allocation of funds, particularly as they relate to the susceptibility of the program to political...

India’s Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) is the largest public works employment project in the world. Its most direct poverty reduction pathway is through boosting employment and income for the poor. How effectively this direct transfer mechanism reduces...

Low demand for micro-insurance has been a prominent problem in developing countries. We study the dynamics of insurance demand by risk-averse farmers who can borrow and lend subject to a credit constraint and who also perceive a risk of insurer default. Credit constraints and the possibility of...

Despite the rise of targeted input subsidy programs in Africa over the last decade, several questions remain as to whether low and variable soil fertility, frequent drought, and high fertilizer prices render fertilizer unprofitable for large subpopulations of African farmers. To examine these...

India’s National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) is one of the largest public works programs globally. Understanding the impacts of NREGS and the pathway through which its impacts are realized thus has important policy implications. We use a three-round 4,000-household panel...

Farmers in developing countries face relatively large income risk and have limited access to formal financial products that can help them manage their risk. We present results from a randomized controlled trial in rural China designed to understand whether a small change in the timing of a...

This paper examines the impact of a large supply-side education intervention in the Philippines, the Third Elementary Education Project, on students' national achievement test scores. We find that the program significantly increased student test scores at grades 4 to 6. The estimate indicates...

This paper examines the long-term impacts of improved school quality at the elementary school stage on subsequent schooling investments and labor market outcomes using unique data from a recent survey that tracked students in the Philippines. Empirical results, based on a comparison of students...

Rapid population growth in many developing countries has raised concerns regarding food security and household welfare. To understand the consequences of population growth on in the general equilibrium setting, we examine the dynamics of population density and its impacts on household outcomes...