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41. Self-Selection into Credit Markets: Evidence from Agriculture in Mali

Author:
Dean Karlan, Bram Thuysbaert, Christopher Udry, and Lori Beaman
Publication Date:
09-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
We partnered with a micro-lender in Mali to randomize credit offers at the village level. Then, in no-loan control villages, we gave cash grants to randomly selected households. These grants led to higher agricultural investments and profits, thus showing that liquidity constraints bind with respect to agricultural investment. In loan-villages, we gave grants to a random subset of farmers who (endogenously) did not borrow. These farmers have lower – in fact zero – marginal returns to the grants. Thus we find important heterogeneity in returns to investment and strong evidence that farmers with higher marginal returns to investment self-select into lending programs.
Topic:
Agriculture and Economics
Political Geography:
Africa

42. The Geography of Inequality: Where and by How Much Has Income Distribution Changed since 1990?

Author:
Andy Sumner and Peter Edward
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The interplay of between-and within-country inequality, the relative contribution of each to overall global inequality, and the implications this has for who benefits from recent global growth (and by how much), has become a significant avenue for economic research. However, drawing conclusions from the commonly used aggregate inequality indices such as the Gini and Theil makes it difficult to take a nuanced view of how global growth interacts with changing national and international inequality.
Topic:
Cold War, Development, Economics, and Globalization

43. Planning for Large-Scale Wind and Solar Power in South Africa: Identifying Cost-Effective Deployment Strategies Using Spatiotemporal Modeling

Author:
Kevin Ummel
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
South Africa and many other countries hope to aggressively expand wind and solar power (WSP) in coming decades. The challenge is to turn laudable aspirations into concrete plans that minimize costs, maximize benefits, and ensure reliability. Success hinges largely on the question of how and where to deploy intermittent WSP technologies. This study develops a 10-year database of expected hourly power generation for onshore wind, solar photovoltaic, and concentrating solar power technologies across South Africa. A simple power system model simulates the economic and environmental performance of different WSP spatial deployment strategies in 2040, while ensuring a minimum level of system reliability.
Topic:
Climate Change, Economics, Energy Policy, Environment, and Science and Technology
Political Geography:
Africa and South Africa

44. Estimating Income / Expenditure Differences across Populations: New Fun with Old Engel's Law

Author:
Lant Pritchett and Marla Spivack
Publication Date:
08-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
How much larger are the consumption possibilities of an urban US household with per capita expenditures of 1,000 US dollars per month than a rural Indonesian household with per capita expenditures of 1,000,000 Indonesian Rupiah per month? Consumers in different markets face widely different consumption possibilities and prices and hence the conversion of incomes or expenditures to truly comparable units of purchasing power is extremely difficult. We propose a simple supplement to existing purchasing power adjusted currency conversions.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Political Economy, Political Theory, Social Stratification, and Socialism/Marxism
Political Geography:
United States and Southeast Asia

45. Revisiting the Quality of Agricultural Official Development Assistance

Author:
Kimberly Ann Elliott and Edward Collins
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The Quality of Official Development Assistance (QuODA) measures how well donors score on the dimensions of aid quality that evidence and experience suggest lead to effective aid. Those dimensions are maximizing efficiency, fostering institutions (in recipient countries), reducing burden (for recipient governments), and transparency and learning (on the part of donors). The Quality of Agricultural Official Development Assistance (Ag QuODA), as much as possible, applies the original QuODA methodology to donors giving agricultural aid. In this update of Ag QuODA, we use new data from the Creditor Reporting System to extend our earlier analysis and update it to 2011. We also examine data on aid activities that the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is now reporting. We find that the quality of official development assistance (ODA) varies widely, with multilateral donors generally doing better on average than bilateral donors. Improvements in the data quality and availability are making sector-specific assessments like Ag QuODA more feasible, but further improvements are needed to allow a deeper understanding of aid effectiveness.
Topic:
Agriculture, Development, Economics, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment

46. Is It All About the Tails? The Palma Measure of Income Inequality

Author:
Alex Cobham and Andy Sumner
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
There are normative or instrumental reasons why inequality may be said to matter (e.g. fairness and meritocracy). However, much global literature has taken an instrumentalist approach as to why high or rising inequality can hinder development. For example, Birdsall (2007) argues that income inequality in developing countries matters for at least three instrumental reasons: where markets are underdeveloped, inequality inhibits growth through economic mechanisms; where institutions of government are weak, inequality exacerbates the problem of creating and maintaining accountable government, increasing the probability of economic and social policies that inhibit growth and poverty reduction; and where social institutions are fragile, inequality further discourages the civic and social life that underpins the effective collective decision-making that is necessary to the functioning of healthy societies.
Topic:
Economics, Poverty, Social Stratification, and Labor Issues

47. Social Capital and Disaster Recovery: Evidence from Sichuan Earthquake in 2008

Author:
Chun Wing Tse, Jianwen Wei, and Yihan Wang
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
Social capital can help reduce adverse shocks by facilitating access to transfers and remittances.This study examines how various measures of social capital are associated with disaster recovery after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. We find that households having a larger Spring Festival network in 2008 do better in housing reconstruction. A larger network significantly increases the amount of government aid received for housing reconstruction. Furthermore, households having larger networks receive monetary and material support from more people, which also explains the positive impacts on recovery from the earthquake. As for other measures of social capital, connections with government officials and communist party membership do not significantly contribute to disaster recovery. Human capital, measured by the years of schooling of household head, is not positively correlated with housing reconstruction.
Topic:
Economics, Humanitarian Aid, Natural Disasters, and Governance
Political Geography:
China and Israel

48. The New Transparency in Development Economics: Lessons from the Millennium Villages Controversy

Author:
Michael Clemens and Gabriel Demombynes
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
The Millennium Villages Project is a high profile, multi-country development project that has aimed to serve as a model for ending rural poverty in sub-Saharan Africa. The project became the subject of controversy when the methodological basis of early claims of success was questioned. The lively ensuing debate offers lessons on three recent mini-revolutions that have swept the field of development economics: the rising standards of evidence for measuring impact, the “open data” movement, and the growing role of the blogosphere in research debates.
Topic:
Development, Economics, Poverty, and Foreign Aid
Political Geography:
Africa

49. Making Large-Scale Wind and Solar Power a Reality

Author:
Kevin Ummel
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
South Africa and many other countries hope to aggressively expand wind and solar power (WSP) in the coming decades. This presents significant challenges for power system planning. Success hinges largely on the question of how and where to deploy WSP technologies. Well-designed deployment strategies can take advantage of natural variability in resources across space and time to help minimize costs, maximize benefits, and ensure reliability.
Topic:
Climate Change, Development, Economics, Energy Policy, Environment, and Industrial Policy
Political Geography:
South Africa

50. The Rebirth of Education: Why Schooling in Developing Countries Is Flailing; How the Developed World Is Complicit; and What to Do Next

Author:
Lant Pritchett
Publication Date:
09-2013
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Center for Global Development
Abstract:
More than a billion children worldwide—95 percent—are in school. That's due in part to steady progress toward the second Millennium Development Goal that every child “be able to complete a full course of primary school” by 2015. To put that in perspective, the average adult in the developing world today receives more schooling than the average adult in advanced countries did in 1960. Schooling, however, is not the same as education. Few of these billion students will receive an education that adequately equips them for their future. The poor quality of education worldwide constitutes a learning crisis; donors and development agencies have been complicit in its creation, but they can and should be part of the solution, not by prescribing changes, but by fostering environments where change is possible.
Topic:
Demographics, Development, Economics, Education, Foreign Aid, and Foreign Direct Investment