We evaluate two labor market interventions targeting young women in Nairobi, Kenya. The first was a multifaceted program involving vocational training, in-kind transfers of physical capital, and ongoing mentoring. The second was an unrestricted cash grant. Both interventions shift women into self-em...

Many public policies create (perceived) winners and losers, but there is little evidence on whether redistribution can support new political economy equilibria that raise aggregate welfare. We conduct a randomized controlled trial in Kampala, Uganda studying aid programs for Ugandans which are expli...

Wage inequality in the public sector is an important determinant of the effectiveness of anti-corruption policies. Increasing the wages of public officials could help reduce corruption in countries with low public sector wage inequality, but in countries where public sector wages are highly unequal,...

Approximately 770 million adults worldwide are classified as illiterate. Despite the potential for adult education programs to bridge this gap, such programs are often plagued by low enrollment, high dropout, and limited skills acquisition. Recent research in educational neuroscience and economics o...

This paper finds that shareholders of highly leveraged firms benefit relatively less compared to bondholders from the corporate quantitative easing (QE) announcements by the European Central Bank and the Bank of England in March 2020, as evidence of debt overhang. Firms more heavily impacted by the ...

This paper examines the link between ministerial continuity in borrower governments and the performance of World Bank education projects implemented between 2000 and 2017 in 114 countries. I use a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods to trace the link between number of ministers durin...

This paper focuses on the content and implementation of reforms to raise teacher quality in Peru in the period 2007-2020 in the hope that other countries facing the same challenges can benefit from this experience. We conclude with reflections on how education policy and education politics have cont...