Most small firms in developing countries have large month-to-month fluctuations in their income stream due to seasonality and unanticipated positive and negative shocks such as business opportunities...
Microcredit promised business growth for small firms lacking access to banking loans. Although microcredit has reached millions, recent randomized evaluations find limited average business impacts. Critics...
This paper analyzes a four-arm randomized evaluation of a multi-faceted economic inclusion intervention delivered by the Government of Niger to female beneficiaries of a national cash transfer program...
Low utilization of household credit in developing countries may be partially due to religious considerations. In a randomized marketing experiment in Jordan, this paper estimates the effect of sharia-compliant...
This study reports results from a randomized evaluation of a mandatory six-month Internet-based sexual education course implemented across public junior high schools in 21 Colombian cities. Six months...
Small and medium-sized enterprises in developing countries tend to struggle with growth compared to their counterparts in more developed economies. Attempts to understand impediments to SME growth have...
International development policy is ripe for an overhaul.Behavioral science can help policy makers to spur changes in behaviors that are difficult to explain from a conventional economic perspective and...
The evidence on demand for sharia-compliant financial services is mixed. On the one hand, IFC-funded studies showed relatively high demand, while results from Findex showed that financial exclusion due...
This brief summarizes the group versus individual liability: long term evidence from Philippines microcredit lending groups for the period 2004-2008. Group liability in microcredit purports to improve...
This brief summarizes what's advertising content worth? Evidence from a consumer credit marketing field experiment in South Africa. The bank offered loans with repayment periods ranging from 4 to 18 months...
There is growing interest in using messaging to drive prosocial behaviors, which contribute to investment in public goods. The authors worked with a leading nongovernmental organization in Peru to randomize...
There is growing interest in using messaging to drive prosocial behaviors, which contribute to investment in public goods. The authors worked with a leading nongovernmental organization in Peru to randomize...
Using a randomized evaluation with 432 Mexican small and medium enterprises, this paper shows that access to management consulting led to better firm performance: one-year results show positive effects...
The authors designed and tested a voluntary commitment product to help smokers quit smoking. The product (CARES) offered smokers a savings account in which they deposit funds for six months, after which...
In much of the developing world, many farmers grow crops for local or personal consumption despite export options that appear to be more profitable. Thus many conjecture that one or several markets are...
Group liability is often portrayed as the key innovation that led to the explosion of the microcredit movement, which started with the Grameen Bank in the 1970s and continues on today with hundreds of...
Microfinance has been heralded as an effective way to address imperfections in credit markets. But from a theoretical perspective, the success of microfinance contracts has puzzling elements. In particular...