We study the efficacy of horizontal versus vertical social learning processes in a public goods game. In one treatment, subjects about to play the game can make nonbinding common knowledge announcements about their intentions while, in another, subjects do not communicate directly with group...

We study the relationship between group size and the extent of risk sharing in an insurance game played over a number of periods with random idiosyncratic and aggregate shocks to income in each period. Risk sharing is attained via agents that receive a high endowment in one period making...

This paper estimates, using a large panel data set from rural Bangladesh, the effects of health shocks on household consumption and how access to microcredit affects households' response to such shocks. Our results suggest that even though in general consumption remains stable in many cases when...

In this paper we examine the demand for education among rural Black households in South Africa using nationally representative data from the 1990s. In particular our study focuses on factors affecting schooling decisions at the household level. Our estimation results reveal strong evidence of a...

This paper draws on a unique data set collected in audits in 2001 and 2002 by the Bureau of Labour and Social Security in Shanghai to examine why firms in Shanghai comply or over-comply with social insurance obligations in a regulatory environment where the expected punishment for non-compliance...

Female wages in Bangladesh are significantly lower compared to male wages. This paper seeks to quantify the extent of discrimination in explaining this gender wage gap. We decompose the gender wage differential into a component that can be explained by differences in productive characteristics...

The primary aim of this paper is to examine the relationship between school attainment, school completion, and economic development. In doing so it also examines the effect of other macroeconomic variables on school attainment and completion. Estimation is conducted using a panel dataset of 138...

A rapid rise in women's education levels, an increase in the age at marriage and an increase in the age at which they have their Þrst child are key features of demographic transition in any country. Education is considered to be an essential component in this process because increases in...

The International Obesity Taskforce calls obesity one of the most important medical and public health problems of our time. An estimated 1 billion people around the world are over weight, of whom around 300 million are clinically obese. Estimates suggest that obesity levels will continue to rise...

This paper extends the collective approach to household behaviour by proposing and estimating a model in which the weights attached to individual members are endogenously determined. The estimation is conducted using two different data-sets from three Indian states. We find that relative...