We estimate the long-term effect of public R&D on growth in manufacturing by analyzing new data from the Cold War era Space Race. We develop a novel empirical strategy that leverages US-Soviet rivalry in space technology to isolate windfall R&D spending. Our results demonstrate that public R&D...

This study combines three rounds of surveys with remote sensing to measure long-term impacts of a randomized irrigation program in the Dominican Republic. Specifically, Landsat 7 and Landsat 8 satellite images are used to measure the causal effects of the program on agricultural productivity,...

The rigorous evaluation of anti-poverty programs is key to the fight against global poverty. Traditional approaches rely heavily on repeated in-person field surveys to measure program effects. However, this is costly, time-consuming, and often logistically challenging. Here we provide the first...

This analysis applies a regression discontinuity approach combined with remote sensing data to measure the productivity impacts linked to a fruit-fly eradication program, implemented in Peru. For this purpose, satellite imagery was used to estimate a vegetation index over a 10-year span for a...