Using experimental techniques, we identify parental attitudes toward different-gendered children in rural Bangladesh. We randomly selected households that had at least two school-age children (6–18 years) of different genders. Parents, either jointly or individually, were given endowments to...

This paper investigates whether parents’ inherent gender bias is associated with intrahousehold human capital investment among boys and girls. We conduct an artifactual field experiment to identify parents’ inherent gender bias and then attempt to examine how this attitude correlates with...

This paper examines whether the differences in the observed savings of immigrant and native households in Australia are related to underlying differences in observable characteristics of the two groups of households or to environmental factors. We use quantile regression and semi-parametric...

The recent debate on alcohol tax reform and recommendations from the Henry Tax Review in Australia have highlighted the need for quantifying externalities of excessive alcohol consumption by beverage types. This paper presents micro-level information from the Australian National Drug Strategy...

There is much interest in the causes of several adverse health outcomes in middle and old age. In searching for new explanations for adverse health outcomes later in life, researchers have started to look beyond behavioural risk factors to examine the effect of shocks to health in utero and in...

The paper examines whether there is any trade-off between child labour hours and child schooling outcomes. By drawing on Bangladesh National Child Labour Survey data, we find that children’s work, even in limited amounts, does adversely affect child human capital. This is reflected in reduced...

Microfinance groups often engage in a variety of collective activities not directly related to credit. Groups can sanction members who default on their loans by excluding them from these activities. Our experiment is designed to explore the effectiveness of such sanctions in improving repayment...

This paper examines the long-term effects of exposure to civil war and genocide on the educational attainment and labor productivity of individuals in Cambodia. Given the well-documented causal links between schooling and labor productivity, it is surprising that past studies show that civil...

This paper provides an analysis of potential unequal burden of bribery in schools on poor households in developing countries. The rich are more likely to pay bribes in the standard model where the probability of punishment for bribe taking by a teacher is the same irrespective of income of the...

This paper examines how availability of microfinance influences households' borrowing from informal sources in village economies. It uses a unique household level panel data set, which spans more than two decades (1987-2008), from rural villages in Bangladesh. We find that households' access to...