We examine the impact of the 1993 Land Law of Vietnam, which gave households the power to exchange, transfer, lease, inherit, and mortgage their land-use rights. We use household surveys before and after the law was passed, together with the considerable variation across provinces in the speed...

Do and Iyer examine the impact of land reform in Vietnam which gives households the power to exchange, transfer, lease, inherit, and mortgage their land-use rights. The authors expect this change to increase the incentives as well as the ability to undertake long-term investments on the part of...

Using updated data, we analyze the long-run effects of two British colonial institutions established in India. Iyer (2010) showed that areas under direct colonial rule had fewer schools, health centers, and roads than areas under indirect colonial rule. Two decades later, we find that these...

Do historical institutions have a persistent impact on economic performance? We analyze the colonial institutions set up by the British to collect land revenue in India, and show that differences in historical property rights institutions lead to sustained differences in economic outcomes. Areas...