{"title":"Social ties at work and effort choice: Experimental evidence from Tanzania","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103354","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103354","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Many firms hire workers via social networks. Whether workers who are socially connected to their employers exert more effort on the job is an unsettled debate. We address this question through a novel experiment with small-business owners in Tanzania. Participants are paired with a worker who conducts a real-effort task, and receive a payoff that depends on the worker’s effort. Some business owners are randomly paired with workers they know, while others are paired with strangers. We find that being connected to one’s employer does not affect workers’ effort on average, but increases the effort of workers without children. Our results are consistent with workers having an altruistic drive in exerting effort when they work for someone they know, which fades away when their valuation of private income becomes stronger.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387824001032/pdfft?md5=41136c935ee9f00f8947e32d2eb2a5f7&pid=1-s2.0-S0304387824001032-main.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142087605","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"How accurate is a poverty map based on remote sensing data? An application to Malawi","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103352","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103352","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>This paper assesses the reliability of poverty maps derived from off-the-shelf remote-sensing data. Employing data for Malawi, it first obtains small area estimates of poverty by combining household expenditure survey data with population census data. It then ignores the population census and obtains a second poverty map by combining the survey with predictors of poverty derived from remote sensing data. The two approaches reveal the same patterns in the geography of poverty. However, there are instances where the two approaches obtain markedly different estimates of poverty. Poverty maps obtained using remote sensing data may do well when the decision maker is interested in comparisons of poverty between assemblies of areas yet may be less reliable when the focus is on estimates for specific small areas.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-09","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142097399","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Unlocking the benefits of credit through saving","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103346","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103346","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Access to microcredit has been shown to generate only modest average benefits for recipient households. We study whether other financial market frictions – in particular, lack of access to a safe place to save – might limit credit’s benefits. Working with Kenyan farmers, we cross-randomize access to a simple savings product with a harvest-time loan. Among loan offer recipients, the additional offer of a savings lockbox increased farm investment by 11% and household consumption by 7%. Results suggest that financial market frictions can interact in important ways and that multifaceted financial access programs might unlock dynamic household gains.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-08","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142020427","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"A Farewell to Arms: Paramilitaries Demobilization, Political Competition and Public Goods in Colombia","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103350","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103350","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Scholars have highlighted how local elites can use their <em>de facto</em> power to capture democracy. This makes electoral competition particularly vulnerable in armed conflicts driven by politics. Would a reduction in politically motivated violence perpetrated by local elites promote electoral competition? To investigate this, I employ a synthetic difference-in-differences strategy within the setting of Colombia’s demobilization of paramilitaries, who were heavily connected with local elites across the country. Following demobilization, I observe an increase in competition. I show that this improvement in competition is consistent with a decrease in repressive violence, leading to an increased likelihood of electoral candidacy for parties that would have potentially been victims of violence in the absence of demobilization. However, I also find that parties associated with elites increased their electoral presence, showing an effort to compensate for the loss produced by demobilization. Finally, I present evidence that public goods investment in territories previously controlled by paramilitaries undergoes a transformation, now benefiting a broader sector of the population, which I argue is partly explained by the increased competition.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141935449","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"The seeds of misallocation: Fertilizer use and maize varietal misidentification in Ethiopia","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103349","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103349","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Optimal input allocation in agriculture leverages production complementarities. For example, improved seeds are generally more responsive to fertilizer than traditional seeds. Thus, inaccurate beliefs about whether seeds are improved may result in sub-optimal fertilizer application. We document precisely this pattern using data from Ethiopia that allows us to compare farmer beliefs about their maize seeds with genotyping data that identify the true genetics of these seeds. We find that 15 percent of farmers believe incorrectly that they are using improved varieties and use far more fertilizer than farmers who correctly believe that they sowed traditional varieties. Conversely, we find that about 15 percent of farmers believe incorrectly that they are growing traditional material and use far less fertilizer than those farmers who correctly believe that they are growing improved material. We extrapolate from our nationally representative sample to estimate the national-level magnitude of fertilizer misallocation due to incorrect seed beliefs.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387824000981/pdfft?md5=a2be69cd14b469f37230ccf7e299f45b&pid=1-s2.0-S0304387824000981-main.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142040103","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Energy policies and pollution in two developing country cities: A quantitative model","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103348","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103348","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>We study the effect of energy and transport policies on pollution in two developing country cities. We use a quantitative equilibrium model with choice of housing, energy use, residential location, transport mode, and energy technology. Pollution comes from commuting and residential energy use. The model parameters are calibrated to replicate key variables for two developing country cities, Maputo, Mozambique, and Yogyakarta, Indonesia. In the counterfactual simulations, we study how various transport and energy policies affect equilibrium pollution. Policies may induce rebound effects from increasing residential energy use or switching to high emission modes or locations. In general, these rebound effects tend to be largest for subsidies to public transport or modern residential energy technology.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-08-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141962487","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Allocating labor across small firms: Experimental evidence on information constraints","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103345","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103345","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>We document interest in labor reallocation among small firm owners in Ghana; 60% and 41%, respectively, self-report willingness to hire or work for the average local firm owner. Firm owners also exhibit high willingness-to-pay for information on a random subset of hiring firms and jobseeking firm owners during a Becker–Degroot–Marschak exercise. Conditionally random variation in access to this information generates immediate labor adjustments within and between firms, though rarely of firm owners themselves, and impacts firm closure 5-months post-intervention. Our findings suggest that labor market information of this kind is both valuable and actionable in our context.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-07-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"142040483","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Land allocation and industrial agglomeration: Evidence from the 2007 reform in China","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103351","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103351","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>This paper highlights the crucial role of land allocation mechanisms in fostering industrial agglomeration by examining China's 2007 industrial land market reform. By introducing transparency into the land-selling process, the reform facilitated more buyers to compete for land (as evidenced by increased land sale prices), enabling local governments to allocate land to the most suitable users. Utilizing comprehensive data sets that include information on initial local industrial structure, new industrial establishments, and industrial land transactions, the empirical analysis finds that the reform significantly increased the entry of firms from industries aligned with local specialization, particularly in regions that implemented the reform more strictly. Industries characterized by substantial unrealized agglomeration economies or highly localized spillover effects experienced amplified effects. A well-functioning capital market further enhanced the land market reform's impact. Supporting evidence demonstrates the reform's positive effect on economic growth (as evidenced by changes in nighttime luminosity), potentially through increasing local firms' TFP.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-07-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141951032","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Corrigendum to Medication against conflict [Journal of Development Economics (2024) Volume 170, September 2024, 103306]","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103347","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103347","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-07-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387824000968/pdfft?md5=7189b05c53b452ac647252d8bb78aa6c&pid=1-s2.0-S0304387824000968-main.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141850616","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Measuring sex-selective abortion: How many women abort?","authors":"","doi":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103342","DOIUrl":"10.1016/j.jdeveco.2024.103342","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>This paper demonstrates that sex-selective abortion induces a correlation between birth interval length and the sex of the next-born child. Using a statistical model, we show that shorter birth intervals for next-born girls indicate <em>repeated</em> sex-selective abortions between consecutive births. Analyzing data from India, we find evidence of repeated sex-selective abortions at birth order 2 when the first child is a girl, and strong evidence at birth order 3 when the first two children are girls. To quantify the extent of repeated abortions, we propose a maximum likelihood estimator that provides the number of women who abort and their likelihood of performing repeated abortions. Our estimation results reveal significant heterogeneity across birth orders, sibling compositions, and socio-demographic and geographic groups. Notably, literate and urban women who first had a girl rarely abort a second time, whereas women in northern India who first had two girls show a 13% likelihood of repeated sex-selective abortion. In this group, the estimated number of aborted female fetuses—the standard measure of sex-selective abortion—is 50% higher than the number of women who abort.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":48418,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Development Economics","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":5.1,"publicationDate":"2024-07-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304387824000919/pdfft?md5=fb33c31b30b404295118259e82eb526f&pid=1-s2.0-S0304387824000919-main.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141785686","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}