We study the interaction between transit improvements and land use policies in the context of Bengaluru, one of India's largest cities. The city inaugurated a metro system in 2011. Yet it has low building heights even near metro stations, reflecting low floor-area ratio limits. We construct a...

This paper reviews the theoretical and empirical literature on the role of financial sector development, with a view to deepening understanding of the rationale of development assistance to the financial sector of developing countries. The review leads to the following broad conclusions: (i)...

The Government of India initiated a program in 1994 to promote manufacturing in districts designated as backward. The way the backward districts were identified enables us to employ a regression discontinuity design to evaluate the impacts of the program. We find that the program's 5-year tax...

This paper presents evidence on the spatial distribution and effects of urban agglomeration on firm innovation. It uses a unique dataset that consistently defines city boundaries and identifies firms' innovation-related activities across 25 developing countries in Asia. We find firm innovation...

The COVID-19 pandemic has adversely affected the livelihoods of hundreds of millions of households, resulting in widespread poverty and food insecurity. To mitigate these effects, many governments have introduced additional benefits as part of their existing welfare schemes. However, there is...

We study the effects of extreme temperature shocks on political participation using data from Indian elections between 2009 and 2017. Taking advantage of localized, high-frequency data on land surface temperatures, we find that areas with greater cumulative exposure to extreme temperatures...

Can democratic politics provide a means for responding to climate change? We explore this question by studying the effects of extreme temperatures on Indian elections between 2009 and 2017. We find that areas exposed to extreme temperatures experience an increase in voter turnout and a change in...

Traditional gender norms can restrict independent migration by women, thus preventing them from taking advantage of economic opportunities in urban non-agricultural industries. However, women may be able to circumvent such restrictions by using marriage to engage in long-distance migration - if...

Are well-functioning formal judicial institutions important for economic development, or can informal contracting arrangements provide adequate substitutes? This paper aims to answer this question using variation across industries in their reliance on contracts along with variation across Indian...

Traditional gender norms can restrict independent migration by women, preventing them from taking advantage of economic opportunities in urban non-agricultural industries. However, women may be able to circumvent such restrictions by using marriage to engage in long-distance migration-if they...