Are new mayors more responsive to disasters than their reelected counterparts? The identification strategy is based on slim vote margin in which new and reelected mayors are found to be as if randomly assigned. We find that with greater storm exposure: new mayors spend more on health sector than...

We use a randomized field experiment to test the causal impact of short-term work experience on employment and school enrollment among disadvantaged, in-school youth in the Philippines. This experience leads to a 4.4 percentage point (79-percent) increase in employment 8 to 12 months later....

The effect of the performance of the judicial system has been thrown into the limelight as the business sector has in various surveys pointed to its performance as being one of the main obstacles and disincentives to doing business in the Philippines. The channels through which judicial...

Temporary incentives are offered in anticipation of persistent effects, but these are seldom estimated. We use a nationwide randomized experiment in the Philippines to estimate effects three years after the withdrawal of two incentives for health insurance. A premium subsidy had a persistent...

Unlike in previous crises, the COVID-19 pandemic has wrought a crisis affecting all population groups, all economic sectors and all jurisdictions in the Philippines, as elsewhere. The impact of the COVID-19 vary across localities, however, partly due to differences in local government responses...