Tanah bengkok (bengkok land) in Java, Indonesia boasts a unique institution where elected village leaders receive usufruct rights to a parcel of land owned by the village, in lieu of salary. Despite its relevance to the political economy of land distribution in Java, unavailability of systematic...

Do local institutions influence the nature of political clientelist exchange? We find a positive answer in the context of a village institution prevalent in Java since the Dutch colonial rule, where democratically elected village heads receive usufruct rights over a piece of communal village...

Job seekers face substantial information frictions, especially in international labor markets where intermediaries match prospective migrants with overseas employers. We conducted a randomized trial in Indonesia to explore how information about intermediary quality shapes migration outcomes....

We study the determinants of hemoglobin concentration in women throughout their life cycle and ask whether anemia during adolescence persists into adulthood. Using a panel of individuals from the Indonesian Family Life Survey (IFLS), we find that although about 30% of our sample was anemic...

This paper uses data from two waves of the Indonesia Family life Survey (IFLS2-1997 and IFLS3-2000) to investigate whether households that belong to the same extended families pool their income to smooth their consumption. We exploit the fact that the survey also tracks and interviews split-off...

Job seekers often face substantial information frictions related to potential job quality. This is especially true in international labor markets, where intermediaries match prospective migrants with employers abroad. We conducted a randomized trial in Indonesia to explore how information about...

Intersectoral linkages can act as shock propagation channels and shape the pattern of structural transformation. To our knowledge, no research has examined how subnational differences in intersectoral linkages impact such spillover effects. We hypothesize that regional differences in local...

This paper examines the nonlinear propagation of sectoral productivity shocks in a general equilibrium framework with intersectoral linkages characterized by allowing elasticities of substitution in sectoral outputs and sectoral productivities to vary across sector pairs. Evidence based on a...

Two well established stylized facts of economic development are a strong correlation between investment and income, and large differences in investment rates across countries. Construction is the largest component of investment. This paper examines the implications of heterogeneity in...

This study examines the effects of mining productivity shocks on the formal-informal duality in manufacturing and services. Using firm census data from 2014 for Ghana, we measure the rates of informality along extensive (unregistered firms) and intensive (registered firms hiring labourers 'off...