Recent anecdotal reports suggest that dropout rates may be higher and actually increasing over time in poor rural areas. There are many reasons not to be surprised that there is a dropout problem, given the fact that China has a high level of poverty among the rural population, a highly...

This paper, using unique survey data from the banking industry in rural China, investigates the effect of incentive contracts on performance. In the context of China`s economic transition, we find that the incentive contracts have a positive effect on the bank manager`s performance in deposit...

In the 1990s, poor, rural youth in China had limited access to college. After mass college expansion started in 1998, however, it was unclear whether poor, rural youth would gain greater access. The goal of our paper is to examine the gap in college and elite college access between poor, rural...

Background: Despite growing wealth and a strengthening commitment from the government to provide quality education, a significant share of students across rural China still have inadequate access to micronutrient-rich regular diets. Such poor diets can lead to nutritional problems, such as...