"This paper proposes that individuals care about the relative income of proximate reference groups. Making use of self-reported life satisfaction as a proxy for unobservable utility, the relative income of siblings is tested for relevance as a reference point for new sample data from Venezuela....

"Formal and informal commercial sex work is a way of life for many poor women in developing countries. Though sex workers have long been identified as crucial in affecting the spread of HIV/AIDS, particularly in Sub-Saharan Africa, the nature of sex-for-money transactions remains poorly...

"This paper explores how the elimination of Madagascar's Marketing Board in 1995 affected prices paid to farmers, incentives, and regional indicators of poverty and inequality. After steadily losing market share, Madagascar has been able to regain some of the lost ground since the mid-1990s....

This is an internal status report to ESMAP and Gesellschaft fur Technische Zusammenarbeit (GTZ) which summarizes their ongoing work under a joint energy study entitled INGENS - Income Generation through Energy and. Complementary Services. INGENS has proposed (and started to test) a pragmatic,...

"The challenge for labor market policy in the transition economies has been to redress the sharp drops in employment and rises in unemployment in a way that fosters the creation of productive jobs. The authors first document the magnitude and productivity of job and worker reallocation. Then...

"The authors follow the Hellerstein, Neumark, and Troske (1999) framework to estimate marginal productivity differentials and compare them with estimated relative wages. The analysis provides evidence on productivity and nonproductivity-based determinations of wages. Special emphasis is given to...

The level of informality in Colombia's labor market is high and persistent. When measuring informality of workers in terms of their contributions to health insurance and pension systems, 74.2 percent of all Colombian labor force was considered informal in 2008. The informality debate has taken...

This Ukraine Jobs Study aims to 1) assess labor market performance in the Ukraine, 2) identify key constraints to job creation, and suggest policies that will foster job creation and productivity. The study finds that, despite relatively low unemployment, the labor market is depressed and...

This Ukraine Jobs Study aims to 1) assess labor market performance in the Ukraine, 2) identify key constraints to job creation, and suggest policies that will foster job creation and productivity. The study finds that, despite relatively low unemployment, the labor market is depressed and...