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Articles 1 - 6 of 6
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Cash Transfers As A Response To Covid-19: A Randomized Experiment In Kenya, Wyatt Brooks, Kevin Donovan, Terence Johnson, Jackline Oluoch-Aridi
Cash Transfers As A Response To Covid-19: A Randomized Experiment In Kenya, Wyatt Brooks, Kevin Donovan, Terence Johnson, Jackline Oluoch-Aridi
Discussion Papers
We deliver an unconditional cash transfer equal to one month’s average profit to a randomly selected group of Kenyan female microenterprise owners in May 2020 at the outset of exponential growth in COVID-19 cases. Firm profit, inventory spending, and food expenditures increased relative to a control group. Entrepreneurs recovered about one third of the profit lost during the crisis. The transfers caused greater business activity by inducing previously closed businesses to re-open. PPE spending and precautionary management practices increase to mitigate this effect, but only among those who perceive major health risk from COVID-19. The results suggest cash transfers promoted …
Migration And Informal Insurance, Costas Meghir, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Corina Mommaerts, Melanie Morten
Migration And Informal Insurance, Costas Meghir, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Corina Mommaerts, Melanie Morten
Discussion Papers
Do new migration opportunities for rural households change the nature and extent of informal risk sharing? We experimentally document that randomly offering poor rural households subsidies to migrate leads to a 40% improvement in risk sharing in their villages. Our model of endogenous migration and risk sharing shows that risky and temporary migration opportunities can induce an improvement in risk sharing enabling profitable migration. Accounting for improved risk sharing, the migration experiment increased welfare by 12.9%. However, permanent declines in migration costs improve outside options for households and can lead to reductions in risk sharing. The short-run experimental results for …
La “Doña” È Mobile: The Role Of Women In Social Mobility In A Pre-Modern Economy, José-Antonio Espín-Sánchez, Salvador Gil-Guirado, Chris Vickers
La “Doña” È Mobile: The Role Of Women In Social Mobility In A Pre-Modern Economy, José-Antonio Espín-Sánchez, Salvador Gil-Guirado, Chris Vickers
Discussion Papers
We use data from marriage records in Murcia, Spain, in the 18th century to study the role of women in social mobility in the pre-modern era. Our measure of socioeconomic standing is identification as a don or doña, an honorific denoting high, though not neccesarily, noble status. We show that this measure, which is acquired over the lifecycle, shows gendered transmission patters. In particular, same-sex transmission is stronger than opposite-sex, for both sons and daughters. The relative transmission from fathers versus mothers varies over the lifecycle, and grandparents may have an effect on the status of their grandchildren.
Creating A New Legal Form: The Gmbh, Timothy W. Guinnane
Creating A New Legal Form: The Gmbh, Timothy W. Guinnane
Discussion Papers
The most common business enterprise for in Germany today is the Gesellschaft mit beschränkter Haftun (GmbH). The GmbH offers entrepreneurs the partnership’s flexibility combined with limited liability, capital lock-in, and other traits associated with corporations. Earlier enterprise forms such as the partnership and corporation were codified versions of longstanding practice; the GmbH, on the other hand, was the lawgiver’s creation. Authorized in 1892, the GmbH appeared during a period of ferment in German enterprise law and was an early example of the “Private Limited-Liability Company” (PLLC) prevalent in many economies today. This paper traces the debates and legislative process that …
Is Fish Brain Food Or Brain Poison? Sea Surface Temperature, Methyl-Mercury And Child Cognitive Development, Mark R. Rosenzweig, Rafael J. Santos
Is Fish Brain Food Or Brain Poison? Sea Surface Temperature, Methyl-Mercury And Child Cognitive Development, Mark R. Rosenzweig, Rafael J. Santos
Discussion Papers
We exploit variation in the composition of local fish catches around the time of birth using largescale administrative and census data on adult cognitive test scores, schooling attainment, and occupation among coastal populations in Colombia to estimate the distinct causal effects of methylmercury (MeHg) and DHA, elements contained in fish, on cognitive development. Using an IV strategy based on an equilibrium model of fish supply that exploits time-series variation in oceanic SST anomalies on both coasts of Colombia from 1950 to 2014 as instruments, we find that net of cohort and municipality fixed effects increases in high-MeHg fish catches around …
Labor Market Dynamics And Development, Kevin Donovan, Will Jianyu Lu, Todd Schoellman
Labor Market Dynamics And Development, Kevin Donovan, Will Jianyu Lu, Todd Schoellman
Discussion Papers
We build a dataset of harmonized rotating panel labor force surveys covering 42 countries across a wide range of development and document three new empirical findings on labor market dynamics. First, labor market flows (job-finding rates, employment-exit rates, and job-to-job transition rates) are two to three times higher in the poorest as compared with the richest countries. Second, employment hazards in poorer countries decline more sharply with tenure; much of their high turnover can be attributed to high separation rates among workers with low tenure. Third, wage-tenure profiles are much steeper in poorer countries, despite the fact that wage-experience profiles …