We investigate financial vulnerability of households with small business owner managers, using 1992 to 2007 Survey of Consumer Finances datasets. Based on regression analyses of two ratios, business assets to total household assets and business income to total household income, we find that...

A century ago, Thorstein Veblen introduced socially contingent con-sumption into the economic literature. This paper complements the scarceempirical literature by testing his conjecture on South African householddata and nds that Black and Coloured households spend relatively moreon visible...

It is generally accepted that lower population growth is associated with positive economic development. Although there is a large body of literature supporting this hypothesis at the macro level, few studies have analyzed the causal effect of fertility on household welfare at the micro level. In...

This study investigates variation over time, space and household and individual characteristics in how people perceive different risks. Using original data from the arid and semi-arid lands of east Africa, we explore which risks concern individuals and how they assess their relative level of...

The overall goal of the report is to increase the capacity of researchers and policy makers to identify comparatively, and across time, how individuals, households and communities are affected by violent conflict. The report provides an extensive overview of existing practices and datasets used...

Rural electrification is believed to contribute to the achievement of the MDG. In this paper, we investigate electrification impacts on different indicators. We use household data that we collected in Rwanda in villages with and without electricity access. We account for self-selection and...

Rural electrification is believed to contribute to the achievement of the MDG. In this paper, we investigate electrification impacts on different indicators. We use household data that we collected in Rwanda in villages with and without electricity access. We account for self-selection and...

We study the determinants of households’ choices of lighting fuels in Kenya including the option of using solar home systems (SHS). Our goal is to add new evidence on the factors that influence the introduction and adoption of decentralized and less carbon-intensive energy sources in...

Although the literature on emission inequality is abundant, this study will differentiate itself by focusing on emission inequalities at the household level due to the disparity in household expenditure profiles. We further separate measures on emission inequality based on household...

One of the well-known barriers to development is persistence of disadvantage among communities. The lack of occupational and therefore upward social mobility continues to restrain households from achieving socially desirable outcomes. This paper studies the effect of short-term internal...