We study the diffusion of a capital intensive technology among a fishing community in south India and analyze the dynamics of income inequality during this process. We find that lack of asset wealth is an important predictor of delayed technology adoption. During the diffusion process,...

We investigate how well social collateral does as an alternative to traditional physical collateral. We do so by studying cosigned loans - a borrower´s loan is backed by the personal guarantee of a cosigner. We use a regression discontinuity approach with data from South Indian bidding Roscas....

If there were no impediments to the flow of capital across space, then interest rates would equalized. We provide evidence to the contrary. We find significant differences in interest rates across the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu, i.e. evidence that financial markets are fragmented. We also...

We study the labor market effects of the roll-out of mobile phone coverage in rural South Africa. We address identification issues which arise from the fact that network roll-out cannot be viewed as an exogenous process to local economic development. We combine spatially coded data from South...

We analyze the effects of the 2004 Indian Ocean Tsunami on credit demand in South India. Combining data from a semi-formal financial intermediary with geophysical data on the Tsunami, we estimate the extent to which the price of credit and the structure of credit flows changed in response to...

A bidding rotating savings and credit association (Rosca) is modeled as a sequence of symmetricindependent-private-value auctions with price-proportional benefits to bidders. We estimate a structural econometric model which, by introducing an altruistic component into each bidder's utility...

This paper empirically analyzes sources of extreme economic distress in rural India. We use district-level data on farmers' suicides in two major states during the years 1998 to 2004 to estimate the effects of transitory economic shocks and structural change in agriculture on the incidence of...

This paper examines the effects of India's Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, currently the world's largest public employment program, on household consumption and poverty rates in rural India. Combining regionally coded data from consumption surveys with information on the...

Targeting of national anti-poverty programs in low-income countries commonly relies on statistical procedures involving household-level survey data, while small-scale poverty-alleviation programs often employ so-called community-based targeting, where village communities themselves identify...

We investigate the properties of health insurance demand in Burkina Faso, where we offered poor households a voluntary health insurance product at half the usual price. The targeting procedure we implemented delivers a fuzzy regression discontinuity design, which identifies the price elasticity...