The broad objectives of theoretical and empirical research at the Economic Growth Center are to understand the process of economic development and growth as well as the associated changes in economic structure. In particular, an understanding of how policies affect that process is necessary for suggesting policies for promoting development. The research is founded on relevant economic theory (micro and macro) and econometric tools. Empirical studies rely on cross-sectional and intertemporal data on micro decision-making units, such as individuals and households, and aggregates, such as nations, interpreted within suitable economic, demographic, and social frameworks. An increasing share of the research involves the study of the behavior of persons, households, and firms, as revealed in sample surveys, and applies the tools of microeconomic theory and associated statistical tools. EGC Discussion Papers report the results of the research efforts of Center members.

EGC faculty, visiting research faculty associated with the EGC and Ph.D. students on the job market wishing to submit a paper to the series should email a completed submission form with the paper to egc[at]yale.edu.

Note to Graduate Students: For graduate students interested in posting papers, use the Munich Personal RePEc Archive (MPRA) repository. More information about creating an account and submitting papers can be found on the MPRA home page. The Yale University listing of papers posted to MPRA can be found on this page.

Follow

Papers from 2024

PDF

Early Childhood Intervention for the Poor: Long term outcomes, Alison Andrew, Orazio Attanasio, Britta Augsburg, Lina Cardosa, Monimalika Day, Michele Giannola, Sally Grantham-McGregor, Pamela Jervis, Costas Meghir, and Marta Rubio Codina

Papers from 2023

PDF

Efficiency and Distributional Effects of Federal College Subsidies during the Great Depression, Gerald Jaynes and Alexander B. Kane

PDF

"Causes and Consequences of State Violence against Civilians: The Rohingya of Myanmar", C. Austin Davis, Paula Lopez, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, and Jaya Y. Wen

PDF

Formalizing Dispute Resolution: Effects of Village Courts in Bangladesh, Martin Mattsson and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

PDF

Growing Like India. The Unequal Effects of Service Lead Growth., Tianyu Fan, Michael Peters, and Fabrizio Zilibotti

PDF

Social and Financial Incentives for Overcoming a Collective Action Problem, M. Mehrab Bakhtiar, Raymond Guiteras, James Levinsohn, and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

Papers from 2022

PDF

More Roads or Public Transit? Insights from Measuring City-Center Accessibility, Lucas Conwell, Fabian Eckert, and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

PDF

The Employment Effects of Mobile Internet in Developing Countries, Gaurav Chiplunkar and Pinelopi K. Goldberg

PDF

Rural-Urban Migration and The Re-organization of Agriculture, Raahil Madhok, Frederik Noack, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, and Olivier Deschenes

PDF

Restrictions on Migration Create Gender Inequality: The Story of China's Left-Behind Children, Xuwen Gao, Wenquan Liang, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, and Ran Song

PDF

Democratization, Elite Capture and Economic Development, Andrew D. Foster and Mark R. Rosenzweig

PDF

Agricultural Productivity and Deforestation: Evidence from Brazil, Dmitri Szerman, Juliano Assunção, Molly Lipscomb, and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

PDF

Encouragement and distortionary effects of conditional cash transfers, Gharad Bryan, Shyamal Chowdhury, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Melanie Morten, and Joeri Smits

Papers from 2021

PDF

Aggregate Implications of Barriers To Female Entrepreneurship, Gaurav Chiplunkar and Pinelopi K. Goldberg

PDF

The US-China Trade War and Global Reallocations, Pablo Fajgelbaum, Pinelopi Goldberg, Patrick Kennedy, Amit Khandelwal, and Daria Taglioni

PDF

The Economics of the COVID-19 Pandemic in Poor Countries, Edward Miguel and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

PDF

The Impact of Community Masking on COVID-19: A Cluster-Randomized Trial in Bangladesh, Jason Abaluck, Laura H. Kwong, Ashley Styczynski, Ashraful Haque, Md. Alamgir Kabir, Ellen Bates-Jeffries, Emily Crawford, Jade Benjamin-Chung, Salim Benhachmi, Shabib Raihan, Shadman Rahman, Neeti Zaman, Peter J. Winch, Md. Maqsud Hossain, Hasan Mahmud Reza, Stephen P. Luby, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Abdulla All Jaber, Shawkee Gulshan Momen, Faika Laz Bani, Aura Rahman, and Tahrima Saiha Huq

PDF

Economic Development, the Nutrition Trap and Metabolic Disease, Nancy Luke, Kaivan Munshi, Anu Mary Oommen, and Swapnil Singh

PDF

Returns to International Migration: Evidence from a Bangladesh-Malaysia Visa Lottery, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Iffath A. Sharif, and Maheshwor Shrestha

PDF

Slippery Fish: Enforcing Regulation when Agents Learn and Adapt, Andres Gonzalez Lira and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

PDF

The Productivity Consequences of Pollution-Induced Migration in China, Gaurav Khanna, Wenquan Liang, A. Mushfiq Mobarak, and Ran Song

Papers from 2020

PDF

Cash Transfers as a Response to COVID-19: A Randomized Experiment in Kenya, Wyatt Brooks, Kevin Donovan, Terence Johnson, and Jackline Oluoch-Aridi

PDF

Migration and Informal Insurance, Costas Meghir, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak, Corina Mommaerts, and Melanie Morten

PDF

La “Doña” è Mobile: the Role of Women in Social Mobility in a Pre-modern Economy, José-Antonio Espín-Sánchez, Salvador Gil-Guirado, and Chris Vickers

PDF

Creating a New Legal Form: The GmbH, Timothy W. Guinnane

PDF

Is Fish Brain Food or Brain Poison? Sea Surface Temperature, Methyl-mercury and Child Cognitive Development, Mark R. Rosenzweig and Rafael J. Santos

PDF

Labor Market Dynamics and Development, Kevin Donovan, Will Jianyu Lu, and Todd Schoellman

Papers from 2018

PDF

Capital Structure and the Choice of Enterprise Form: theory and history, Timothy Guinnane and Jakob Schneebacher

PDF

Can Network Theory-based Targeting Increase Technology Adoption?, Lori Beaman, Ariel BenYishay, Jeremy Magruder, and Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak

Papers from 2016

PDF

Networks in Conflict: Theory and Evidence from the Great War of Africa, Michael D. König, Dominic Rohner, Mathias Thoenig, and Fabrizio Zilibotti

PDF

Banking the Unbanked? Evidence from three countries, Pascaline Dupas, Dean Karlan, Jonathan Robinson, and Diego Ubfal

PDF

External Validity in a Stochastic World, Mark Rosenzweig and Christopher Udry

PDF

Insurgency and Small Wars: Estimation of Unobserved Coalition Structures, Francesco Trebbi and Eric Weese

Papers from 2013

PDF

Risk, Insurance and Wage in General Equilibrium, Ahmed Mushfiq Mobarak and Mark Rosenzweig

PDF

Follow the Money: Methods for Identifying Consumption and Investment Responses to a Liquidity Shock, Dean Karlan, Adam Osman, and Jonathan Zinman

PDF

Savings By and For the Poor: A Research Review and Agenda, Dean Karlan, Aishwarya Lakshmi Ratan, and Jonathan Zinman

PDF

Targeting Ultra-poor Households in Honduras and Peru, Dean Karlan and Bram Thuysbaert

PDF

Communicating with Farmers through Social Networks, Ariel Benyishay and A. Mushfiq Mobarak

PDF

Continued Existence of Cows Disproves Central Tenets of Capitalism?, Santosh Anagol, Alvin Etang, and Dean Karlan

PDF

Forecasting Profitability, Mark Rosenzweig and Chris Udry

PDF

Agricultural Decisions after Relaxing Credit and Risk Constraints, Dean Karlan, Isaac Osei-Akoto, Robert Darko Osei, and Christopher Udry

PDF

Escaping Famine through Seasonal Migration, Gharad Bryan, Shyamal Chowdhury, and Ahmed Musfiq Mobarak

PDF

The Caloric Costs of Culture: Evidence from Indian Migrants, David Atkin

PDF

Long-Run Price Elasticities of Demand for Credit: Evidence from a Countrywide Field Experiment in Mexico, Dean Karlan and Jonathan Zinman

PDF

Mixed Method Evaluation of a Passive mHealth Sexual Information Texting Service in Uganda, Julian Jamison, Dean Karlan, and Pia Raffler

PDF

Problems of Sample-selection Bias in the Historical Heights Literature: A Theoretical and Econometric Analysis, Howard Bodenhorn, Timothy Guinnane, and Thomas A. Mroz

PDF

Win Some Lose Some? Evidence from a Randomized Microcredit Program Placement Experiment by Compartamos Banco, Manuela Angelucci, Dean Karlan, and Jonathan Zinman

PDF

Political Mergers as Coalition Formation: An Analysis of the Heisei Municipal Amalgamations, Eric Weese

PDF

A Two-Tiered Demographic System: "Insiders" and "Outsiders" in Three Swabian Communities, 1558-1914, Timothy Guinnane and Sheilagh Ogilvie

PDF

Probability of Fertilizer: Experimental Evidence from Female Rice Farmers in Mali, Lori Beaman, Dean Karlan, Bram Thuysbaert, and Christopher Udry

Papers from 2012

PDF

Labor Surplus Revisited, Gustav Ranis

PDF

Wages and Informality in Developing Countries, Costas Meghir, Renata Narita, and Jean-Marc Robin

PDF

Another Look at Foreign Aid, Gustav Ranis

PDF

Hoping to Win, Expected to Lose: Theory and Lessons on Micro Enterprise Development, Dean Karlan, Ryan Knight, and Christopher Udry

PDF

Incentives That Saved Lives: Government Regulation of Accident Insurance Associations in Germany, 1884-1914., Timothy Guinnane and Jochen Streb

PDF

Vertical and Horizontal Decentralization and Ethnic Diversity in Sub-Saharan Africa, Gustav Ranis

PDF

For Every Law a Loophole: Flexibility in the Menu of Spanish Business Forms, 1886-1936., Timothy Guinnane and Susana Martinez-Rodriguez

PDF

A Personal Touch: Text Messaging for Loan Repayment, Dean Karlan, Melanie Morten, and Jonathan Zinman

PDF

Economic Growth, Comparative Advantage, and Gender Differences in Schooling Outcomes: Evidence from the Birthweight Differences of Chinese Twins, Mark Rosenzweig and Junsen Zhang

PDF

Selling Formal Insurance to the Informally Insured, A. Mushfiq Mobarak and Mark R. Rosenzweig

PDF

The Impact of Consulting Services on Small and Medium Enterprises: Evidence from a Randomized Trial in Mexico, Miriam Bruhn, Dean Karlan, and Antoinette Schoar

PDF

Looking Beyond the Incumbent: The Effects of Exposing Corruption on Electoral Outcomes, Alberto Chong, Ana L. De La O., Dean Karlan, and Leonard Wantchekon

PDF

You Can Pick Your Friends, But You Need to Watch Them: Loan Screening and Enforcement in a Referrals Field Experiment, Gharad Bryan, Jonathan Zinman, and Dean Karlan