Child health, particularly long-term nutritional status, is closely related to the characteristics of families, communities and children, including level of education and access to public services,. Public policy has a crucial role in increasing the likelihood that a child can access high...

Despite improvements in enrolment rates in recent decades, the Peruvian school system still has serious shortcomings. A high drop-out rate in secondary school stems from the fact that the system does not provide adequate support for students who fall behind, cannot afford to go to school, or...

We exploit exogenous variation in the price of connection fees to study the process of adoption of for formal connection to the electric grid in northern El Salvador. This variation, generated by randomly allocating discount vouchers among households, also generated exogenous variation in the...

We implemented an experimental study to better understand how electrification affects the economic lives of rural households. By randomly allocating incentives to get a grid connection we generate exogenous variation in the probability that households connect to the grid, which we exploit to...

We conduct a remittance field experiment among Salvadoran migrants in the metro DC area. Migrants need to decide whether or not to remit funds to a recipient in El Salvador and if so how much. We maintain a (2x2) design in which the remittance budget has a value of $400 or $200, and the remitted...

A key question in development economics is whether nutritional deficiencies generate intergenerational poverty traps by reducing the earnings potential of children born into poverty. To assess the causal influence on human capital of one of the most widespread micronutrient deficiencies,...

This paper assesses the importance of social interactions in determining an individual’s choice to connect to an electrical grid, using an original dataset on a new rural electrification program in Ethiopia. Combining GPS information with random allocation of discount vouchers for connection...

We analyze the impact of the Strengthening Women Entrepreneurship in Peru (SWEP) program. SWEP trained female micro-entrepreneurs on business management practices (e.g. accounting, marketing, etc.). The training was provided in 4-5 hour sessions using soap operas and practical exercises...

In this paper we explore the effects of fiscal policies and growth on measures of the household welfare across the distribution of expenditure for two countries in Africa: Rwanda and Tanzania. We explore issues of inefficiency in government expenditures and dilution of growth benefits among the...

In this paper we examine the effects of media coverage of commodity prices increases and decreases on the price of the commodity and how media coverage in other commodities affects prices. We provide evidence of the relationship between media coverage and its intensity to the price level of...