We investigate how religious beliefs affected the take up of the birth control pill and impacted women's outcomes using the 1970 liberalization of oral contraceptives in the Netherlands. We first document a massive and immediate drop in fertility among minor women, aged 21 or younger, for whom...

Rapid urbanization could have positive and negative health effects, such that the net impact on population health is not obvious. It is, however, highly pertinent to the human welfare consequences of development. This paper uses community and individual level longitudinal data from the China...

This paper develops a model of healthcare demand to study healthcare choices in resourcelimited settings with poor health indicators, especially for women. Using data from rural Nigeria on individual illnesses and injuries as well as the entire portfolio of locally available providers, we...

In this paper, we examine the role of intertemporal and social preferences in explaining cooperation in social dilemmas. Recently, the COVID-19 pandemic caused an acute social dilemma in the Netherlands. In this dilemma, citizens had to decide whether or not to comply with the personal measures...

Sexual minorities have had worse than average mental health, which may have to do with actual or perceived discrimination. Same-sex marriage legalization (SSML) is a typical anti-discrimination policy removing marital restrictions for sexual minorities. We study how this legislation affected...

We provide novel evidence on the effect of smart phone use on road accidents. We exploit variation in phone usage fees in the Netherlands following a change in European Union (EU) roaming regulations implemented in 2017. The growth rate of mobile data roaming increased substantially after the...

We investigate the impact on work absence of a massive reduction in paid sick leave benefits. We exploit a policy change that only affected public sector workers in Spain and compare changes in the number and length of spells they take relative to unaffected private sector workers. Our results...

Population-based screening can prevent disease but also induce false positives to use low-value healthcare. Using data on individuals aged 40+ in rural South Africa and a multidimensional regression discontinuity design, we estimate effects of clinical referral based on blood pressure (BP) above...

This study analyses the relation between perceived health status and intertemporal choice. We use data from experiments with real monetary rewards conduEted among students in South Africa to estimate risk and time preferences. These experimental data, based on muitiple price lists developed by...

We use a classic Merton credit risk framework to argue that Islamic Banking Institutions (IBIs) face less incentive to take on risks than Conventional Banking Institutions (CBI). IBIs have less incentive for risk shifting both in and outside of distress situations. We test and confirm this...