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Three Applied Economic Studies in Collaboration with Government Policymakers
This manuscript features three independent applications of contemporarytechniques in applied economics conducted in collaboration with three differentgovernments. In the first essay, I present findings from an experimentalintervention conducted in collaboration with the government of the DominicanRepublic in which the government varies whether front-line volunteercommunity workers are recruited through a public advertisement or throughlocal staff referrals. I find that governments likely face tradeoffs in selectingoptimal recruiting mechanisms as publicly recruited candidates demonstratesuperior observable characteristics to referred candidates across a wide variety ofindicators except for the key indicator of cognitive skills. I also find publiccandidates are more likely to accept job offers and attend trainings conditionalon being hired. To my knowledge, this is the first study to rigorously test theimpacts of an open public recruitment process versus a private targetedrecruitment process.In the second essay, my co-author and I evaluate impacts of a World Bankfunded road improvement and employment generation intervention inNicaragua. We employ a difference-in-difference research design, matchingproprietary road building data from the government of Nicaragua’s Ministry ofTransportation with three rounds of a publicly available household survey. Wefind strong evidence that the World Bank’s Fourth Roads Rehabilitation andMaintenance Project fulfilled its primary goal of improving road infrastructureand suggestive evidence of select economic and social impacts. Notably, we donot observe impacts on the likelihood of employment or incidence of poverty.In the third essay, I collaborate with the City of San Francisco’s Office ofthe Treasurer to investigate mechanisms that potentially mediate householddecisions to save for distant future expenditures with particular relevance foreducation-oriented savings. Employing a randomized experiment in the naturalsetting of the Kindergarten-to-College school district-wide college savingsprogram, I vary the messages of postcard savings reminders with informationabout either the availability of college financial aid or the increasing cost oftuition. My results suggest that savings reminders may overcome inattention tolumpy future expenditures, but only among those who intended to save. I findno evidence that manipulating the salience of college cost affects savingsbehavior
Recommended from our members
Three Applied Economic Studies in Collaboration with Government Policymakers
This manuscript features three independent applications of contemporarytechniques in applied economics conducted in collaboration with three differentgovernments. In the first essay, I present findings from an experimentalintervention conducted in collaboration with the government of the DominicanRepublic in which the government varies whether front-line volunteercommunity workers are recruited through a public advertisement or throughlocal staff referrals. I find that governments likely face tradeoffs in selectingoptimal recruiting mechanisms as publicly recruited candidates demonstratesuperior observable characteristics to referred candidates across a wide variety ofindicators except for the key indicator of cognitive skills. I also find publiccandidates are more likely to accept job offers and attend trainings conditionalon being hired. To my knowledge, this is the first study to rigorously test theimpacts of an open public recruitment process versus a private targetedrecruitment process.In the second essay, my co-author and I evaluate impacts of a World Bankfunded road improvement and employment generation intervention inNicaragua. We employ a difference-in-difference research design, matchingproprietary road building data from the government of Nicaragua’s Ministry ofTransportation with three rounds of a publicly available household survey. Wefind strong evidence that the World Bank’s Fourth Roads Rehabilitation andMaintenance Project fulfilled its primary goal of improving road infrastructureand suggestive evidence of select economic and social impacts. Notably, we donot observe impacts on the likelihood of employment or incidence of poverty.In the third essay, I collaborate with the City of San Francisco’s Office ofthe Treasurer to investigate mechanisms that potentially mediate householddecisions to save for distant future expenditures with particular relevance foreducation-oriented savings. Employing a randomized experiment in the naturalsetting of the Kindergarten-to-College school district-wide college savingsprogram, I vary the messages of postcard savings reminders with informationabout either the availability of college financial aid or the increasing cost oftuition. My results suggest that savings reminders may overcome inattention tolumpy future expenditures, but only among those who intended to save. I findno evidence that manipulating the salience of college cost affects savingsbehavior