Two decades of empirical evaluation have shown that corruption has a negative impact on economic growth, political stability, judicial effectiveness, democratization, educational attainment, and equality of income. However, corruption exists, persists, and varies significantly by culture. Lab...

Although substantial progress has been made in combating malnutrition at the global level, chronic maternal and child malnutrition remains a serious problem in many parts of the developing world. This paper, using a randomized control trial design in Nepal, evaluates a program that provided...

This paper examines the sustainability of weight loss achieved through cash rewards and, for the first time, the potential of monetary incentives to prevent weight cycling. In a three period randomized controlled trial, about 700 obese persons were assigned to two treatment groups, which were...

Although the importance of diet quality for improving child health is widely recognized, the roles of environmental factors and the absorption of nutrients for children's physical growth and morbidity have not been adequately integrated into a policy framework. Moreover, nutrient intakes...

This paper investigates the impact of increases in wheat flour prices on household food security using unique nationally-representative data collected in Afghanistan from 2007 to 2008. It uses a new estimator, the Unconditional Quantile Regression estimator, based on influence functions, to...

Rising obesity rates are one of the most challenging public health issues in many emerging economies. The extent to which the nutritional composition of food consumed away from home is behind this rise, and the links with socioeconomic status, is not yet well understood. This paper explores this...

Nonseparable household models outline the links between agricultural production and household consumption, yet empirical extensions to investigate the effect of production on dietary diversity and diet composition are limited. Although a significant literature has investigated the calorie-income...

Using longitudinal data on more than 2,000 Russian families spanning the period between 2007 and 2010, this paper estimates the impact of the 2009 global financial crisis on food expenditures, health care expenditures, and doctor visits in Russia. The primary estimation strategy adopted is the...

The 2008 "food price crisis" and more recent spikes in food prices have led to a greater focus on policies and programs to cushion their impact on poverty and malnutrition. Estimating the income elasticity of micro-nutrients and assessing how they change during such crises is an important part...

This paper evaluates a program targeted to adolescent girls in Tanzania that aims to empower them economically as well as socially. The program was found to be highly successful in Uganda in terms of economic, health, and social outcomes. In contrast, this evaluation finds that the program did...