Mobile Banking: The Impact of M-Pesa in Kenya

M-Pesa is a mobile phone based money transfer system in Kenya which grew at a blistering pace following its inception in 2007. We examine how M-Pesa is used as well as its economic impacts. Analyzing data from two waves of individual data on financial access in Kenya, we find that increased use of M-Pesa lowers the propensity of people to use informal savings mechanisms such as ROSCAS, but raises the probability of their being banked. Using aggregate data, we calculate the velocity of M-Pesa at roughly four person-to-person transfers per month. In addition, we find that M-Pesa causes decreases in the prices of competing money transfer services such as Western Union. While we find little evidence that people use their M-Pesa accounts as a place to store wealth, our results suggest that M-Pesa improves individual outcomes by promoting banking and increasing transfers.

Mobile Banking: The Impact of M-Pesa in Kenya

M-Pesa is a mobile phone based money transfer system in Kenya which grew at a blistering pace following its inception in 2007. We examine how M-Pesa is used as well as its economic impacts. Analyzing data from two waves of individual data on financial access in Kenya, we find that increased use of M-Pesa lowers the propensity of people to use informal savings mechanisms such as ROSCAS, but raises the probability of their being banked. Using aggregate data, we calculate the velocity of M-Pesa at between 11.0 and 14.6 person-to-person transfers per month. In addition, we find that M-Pesa causes decreases in the prices of competing money transfer services such as Western Union. While we find little evidence that people use their M-Pesa accounts as a place to store wealth, our results suggest that M-Pesa improves individual outcomes by promoting banking and increasing transfers.NBER Working Paper No. 17129

Health Workers' Behavior, Patient Reporting and Reputational Concerns: Lab-in-the-Field Experimental Evidence from Kenya

We use a lab-in-the-field experiment to examine the effectiveness of accountability systems that rely on patient reporting in Kenyan health clinics. We recruit patients and health care providers from public and private health clinics to play a series of modified Trust Games. In the game, patients can send money to providers, who are then able to reciprocate. Patients can then file complaints if they are unhappy with the provider's level of reciprocity. We examine patient and provider behavior in a system where complaints lead to non-monetary consequences in the form of disclosing the complaints to professional peers, a system where complaints lead to monetary penalties, and a system where there are no direct consequences on providers, such as standard complaint boxes (our "control"). We focus on provider reciprocity and patient reporting (or complaining) as our primary behavioral measures in the game. Combining the experimental variation in provider consequences with non-experimental variation in provider and client characteristics such as sector of work, and the existence of personal relationships between clients and providers, we find that: 1) disclosing patients' complaints to providers' professional peers increases providers' pro-social behavior toward patients as much as imposing monetary penalties based on patients' complaints; 2) when complaints lead to tangible consequences (either monetary or non-monetary) for providers, patients are less willing to file such complaints, mainly due to the existence of personal relationships with providers. Overall, our findings support the implementation of citizen reporting systems that leverage peer pressure and reputational concerns

Can Public Rankings Improve School Performance? Evidence from a Nationwide Reform in Tanzania

In 2013, Tanzania introduced "Big Results Now in Education", a low-stakes accountability program that published both nationwide and within-district school rankings. Using data from the universe of school performance from 2011-2016, we identify the impacts of the reform using a difference-in-differences estimator that exploits the differential pressure exerted on schools at the top and bottom of their respective district rankings. We find that BRN improved learning outcomes for schools in the bottom two deciles of their districts. However, the program also led schools to strategically exclude students from the terminal year of primary school