We analyze the effect of a Chilean school reform that lengthened the school day from half to full-day shifts on the likelihood that adolescents engage in risky behaviors. By increasing the number of hours spent in school, the reform curtails opportunities to engage in risky behaviors that may...

Whether user fees for health services should be charged or abolished for the poor has recently been debated. This study examines the impact on child health status of removing user fees in South Africa. Our main innovation is to exploit plausibly exogenous variation in access to free health care,...

This paper analyzes Thailand's 2001 healthcare reform, "30 Baht." The program increased funding available to hospitals to care for the poor and reduced copays to 30 Baht (~$0.75). Our estimates suggest the supply-side funding of the program increased healthcare utilization, especially among the...

We report an experiment in 3,000 villages that tested whether incentives improve aid efficacy. Villages received block grants for maternal and child health and education that incorporated relative performance incentives. Subdistricts were randomized into incentives, an otherwise identical...

Teenage pregnancy in the Dominican Republic represents a persistent development challenge. This paper uses data from a randomized impact evaluation of the youth training program Juventud y Empleo, which includes soft skills training, to examine its impact on teenage pregnancy. We find that the...

We use a unique longitudinal dataset from Peru to investigate the relationship between psychosocial competencies related to the concepts of self-esteem, self-efficacy, and aspirations, and a number of risky behaviours at a crucial transition period between adolescence and early adulthood. First...