Summary The Addis Ababa Integrated Housing Development Program (AAIHDP) aims to tackle the housing shortage and unemployment that prevail in Addis Ababa by deploying and supporting small enterprises to construct low-cost housing using technologies novel for Ethiopia. The motivation for such...

The cost of energy in Eastern Europe and Central Asia, as elsewhere, is an important policy issue, as shown by the concerns for energy affordability during the past harsh winter. Governments try to moderate the burden of energy expenditures that is experienced by households through subsidies to...

This paper examines private sector job creation in Tunisia over the period 1996-2010 using a unique database containing information on all registered private enterprises, including self-employment. In spite of stable growth of gross domestic product, overall net job creation was disappointing...

This paper uses uniquely matched household, enterprise and community survey data from four major regions in rural Ethiopia to characterize the performance, constraints and opportunities of nonfarm enterprises. The nonfarm enterprise sector is sizeable, particularly important for women, and plays...

Despite their increasing prominence in policy debates, little is known about gender inequities in non-agricultural labor market outcomes in rural areas. Using matched household-enterprise-community data sets from Bangladesh, Ethiopia, Indonesia and Sri Lanka, this paper documents and analyzes...

In a crisis, do employers place the burden of adjustment disproportionately on female employees? Relying on household and labor force data, existing studies of the distributional impact of crises have not been able to address this question. This paper uses Indonesia's census of manufacturing...

Using Indonesian manufacturing census data (1991-2001), this paper rejects the hypothesis that the East Asian crisis unequivocally improved the reallocative process. The correlation between productivity and employment growth did not strengthen and the crisis induced the exit of relatively...

This paper examines the relationship between regulation and the business interests of President Ben Ali and his family, using firm-level data from Tunisia for 1994-2010. Data on investment regulations are merged with balance sheet and firm-level census data in which 220 firms owned by the Ben...

Events of the past two years are a reminder that crises are a recurring phenomenon with deep and often protracted impacts on labor markets. This paper examines the challenges inherent in crafting policy responses, with particular attention to developing countries. It focuses on the potential...