the state of female autonomy in india a stochastic dominance approach abstractthe promotion of female autonomy is both intrinsically and instrumentally desirable we document differences in the distribution of female autonomy in india using the national family health survey 2005 2006 addressing two methodological challenges the multidimensional nature of the concept and its frequent measurement with ordinal variables which are not amenable to direct comparisons of social averages we tackle these challenges with three methods based on stochastic dominance techniques suited for ordinal and dichotomous variables whenever these dominance conditions hold for a pairwise comparison we can conclude that the multidimensional autonomy distribution in one state is more desirable than in another one across a broad range of criteria for the individual and social welfare evaluation of autonomy consistently across the three methods we find that most of the states with better autonomy distributions in pairwise comparisons come from the north east and the south whereas most of

generating skilled self employment in developing countries experimental evidence from uganda we study a government program in uganda designed to help the poor and unemployed become self employed artisans increase incomes and thus promote social stability young adults in uganda s conflict affected north were invited to form groups and submit grant proposals for vocational training and business start up funding was randomly assigned among screened and eligible groups treatment groups received unsupervised grants of 382 per member grant recipients invest some in skills training but most in tools and materials after four years half practice a skilled trade relative to the control group the program increases business assets by 57 work hours by 17 and earnings by 38 many also formalize their enterprises and hire labor we see no effect however on social cohesion antisocial behavior or protest effects are similar by gender but are qualitatively different for women because they begin poorer meaning the impact is larger relative to their starting point and because women s work and earnings stagnate without the program but take off with it the patterns we observe are consistent with credit constraints

why did the energy intensity fall in china s industrial sector in the 1990s the relative importance of structural change and intensity change there have been a variety of studies investigating the relative importance of structural change and real intensity change to the change in china s energy consumption in the 1980s however no detailed analysis to date has been done to examine whether or not the increased energy efficiency trend in the 1980s still prevailed in the 1990s this article has filled this gap by investigating the change in energy consumption in china s industrial sector in the 1990s based on the data sets of value added and end use energy consumption for the 29 industrial subsectors and using the newly proposed decomposition method of giving no residual our results clearly show that the overwhelming contributor to the decline in industrial energy use in the 1990s was the decline in real energy intensity indicating that the trend of real energy intensity declines in the 1980s at the 2 digit level was still maintained in the 1990s this conclusion still holds even if we lower the growth rate dramatically in line with the belief that the growth rate of china s gdp may be overestimated

the influential factors of china s regional energy intensity and its spatial linkages 1988 2007 abstract a large amount of literature on china s energy intensity seldom considers the regional differences of energy intensity inside china and the spatial effects based on spatial statistics methods this paper explores the regional imbalance of china s provincial energy intensity and the spatially correlation of energy intensity among provinces using spatial panel data models this paper finds that gdp per capita transportation infrastructure the level of marketization and scientific and technological input significantly reduce the energy intensity the ratio of heavy industries to total industries and the ratio of coal consumption to total energy consumption significantly expand the energy intensity meanwhile the coefficient of the ratio of export to gdp is not significant then the spillover and convergence of china s regional energy intensity have been tested the results indicate that the spillover effect between the eastern and western china is remarkable and there exist absolute convergence of provincial energy intensity moreover gdp per capita transportation infrastructure the level of marketization and scientific technological input are conducive to conditional convergence after the spatial effects are controlled according to the empirical results this paper proposes some policy suggestions on reducing china s energy intensity

women empowerment and economic development women empowerment and economic development are closely related in one direction development alone can play a major role in driving down inequality between men and women in the other direction empowering women may benefit development does this imply that pushing just one of these two levers would set a virtuous circle in motion this paper reviews the literature on both sides of the empowerment development nexus and argues that the interrelationships are probably too weak to be self sustaining and that continuous policy commitment to equality for its own sake may be needed to bring about equality between men and women

china s changing energy intensity trend a decomposition analysis china experienced a dramatic decline in energy intensity from the onset of economic reform in the late 1970s until 2000 but since then the rate of decline slowed and energy intensity actually increased in 2003 most previous studies found that most of the decline was due to technological change but disagreed on the role of structural change to the best of our knowledge no decomposition study has investigated the role of inter fuel substitution in the decline in energy intensity or the causes of the rise in energy intensity since 2000 in this paper we use logarithmic mean divisia index lmdi techniques to decompose changes in energy intensity in the period 1980 2003 we find that 1 technological change is confirmed as the dominant contributor to the decline in energy intensity 2 structural change at the industry and sector sub industry level actually increased energy intensity over the period of 1980 2003 although the structural change at the industry level was very different in the 1980s and in the post 1990 period 3 structural change involving shifts of production between sub sectors however decreased overall energy intensity 4 the increase in energy intensity since 2000 is explained by negative technological progress 5 inter fuel substitution is found to contribute little to the changes in energy intensity

substitution possibilities and determinants of energy intensity for china abstract this paper measures technological change factor demand and inter factor and inter fuel substitutability measures for china we use individual fuel price data and a two stage approach to estimate total factor cost functions and fuel share equations both inter factor and inter fuel substitution elasticities are calculated and the change in energy intensity is decomposed into its driving forces the results suggest that energy is substitutable for capital regionally and for labor nationally capital substitutes for energy more easily than labor does energy intensity changes vary by region but the major drivers seem to be budget effect and the adoption of energy intensive technologies which might be embodied in high level energy using exports and sectors capital investment and even old technique and equipment imports whether the trend in rising energy intensity continues will be significant for china and the rest of the world

government expenditure and energy intensity in china the recent economic stimulus package of china has raised growing concern about its potential impact on energy demand and efficiency to what extent does such expansion of government expenditure influence energy intensity this question has not been well answered by the previous research using provincial panel data this paper provides some evidence of a link between government expenditure and energy intensity in china the empirical results demonstrate that the expansion of government expenditure since asian financial crisis has exerted a significant influence on energy intensity an increase in government expenditure in china leads to an increase in energy intensity further analysis compares such relationships in different economic situations the comparison shows that such positive effect of government expenditure remains significant after the alteration in economic situation therefore the results suggest introducing some measures to consolidate china s existing gains in energy efficiency the analysis also explains why the downward trend in energy intensity is reversed in china since 2002

ecological total factor energy efficiency of regions in china most existing energy efficiency indices are computed without taking into account undesirable outputs such as co2 and so2 emissions this paper computes the ecological total factor energy efficiency etfee of 30 regions in china for the period 2005 2009 through the slack based model sbm with undesirable outputs we calculate the etfee index by comparing the target energy input obtained from sbm with undesirable outputs to the actual energy input findings show that china s regional etfee still remains a low level of around 0 600 and regional energy efficiency is overestimated by more than 0 100 when not looking at environmental impacts china s regional energy efficiency is extremely unbalanced the east area ranks first with the highest etfee of above 0 700 the northeast and central areas follow and the west area has the lowest etfee of less than 0 500 a monotone increasing relation exists between the area s etfee and china s per capita gdp the truncated regression model shows that the ratio of r d expenditure to gdp and the degree of foreign dependence have positive impacts whereas the ratio of the secondary industry to gdp and the ratio of government subsidies for industrial pollution treatment to gdp have negative effects on the etfee

china s ongoing energy efficiency drive origins progress and prospects abstract in 2004 china s government launched a vigorous programme to reverse the trend of rising national energy intensity and to reduce intensity by 20 over the period 2006 2010 the aim of this paper is to examine this programme in the context of nearly 30 years of measures to enhance energy efficiency in china and thus to evaluate the likelihood that today s policies will yield improvements over a longer period the country achieved a sustained decline of energy intensity in the period 1980 2001 but this trend was reversed in 2002 this reversal arose from a shift in the structure of the economy to more energy intensive industries and from a decline in the rate of technical innovation the measures taken since 2003 have been directed principally at energy intensive industries but have also addressed other sectors of the economy though the energy intensity target for the year 2010 may be achieved greater efforts will be needed to address a number of constraints which include the reluctance to use economic and financial instruments the dependency of energy policy on industrial and social policies the nature of political decision making and of public administration a shortage of skills and social attitudes to energy

do traditional institutions constrain female entrepreneurship a field experiment on business training in india what constrains the entrepreneurial choices of poor women do traditional institutions pose unique barriers to business growth and profitability for female run enterprises the explosion of microfinance programs which typically target poor female entrepreneurs has drawn attention to these questions indeed one view is that inadequate access to credit prevents women from undertaking high return business activities however one recent empirical study finds low returns to capital in female run micro enterprises suresh de mel david mckenzie and christopher woodruff 2008 thus another view is that the primary barrier to female entrepreneurial success is limited demand for rather than supply of credit with poor women lacking high return means of expanding their businesses for instance due to gender differences in education or business networks women might be relatively uninformed about investment opportunities and untrained in basic cost benefit analysis dean s karlan and martin valdivia 2008 a second possibility is that norms governing women s roles in society limit women s perceptions about what is achievable in the workplace even differences

the labor demand was downward sloping disentangling migrants inflows and outflows 1929 1957 this paper studies in and out migration from the u s during the first half of the twentieth century and assesses how these flows affected state level labor markets it shows that out migration positively impacted the earnings growth of remaining workers while in migration had a negative impact hence immigrant arrivals were substitutes of the existing workforce while out migration reduced the competitive pressure on labor markets

total factor energy efficiency of regions in china abstract this paper analyzes energy efficiencies of 29 administrative regions in china for the period 1995 2002 with a newly introduced index most existing studies of regional productivity and efficiency neglect energy inputs we use the data envelopment analysis dea to find the target energy input of each region in china at each particular year the index of total factor energy efficiency tfee then divides the target energy input by the actual energy input in our dea model labor capital stock energy consumption and total sown area of farm crops used as a proxy of biomass energy are the four inputs and real gdp is the single output the conventional energy productivity ratio regarded as a partial factor energy efficiency index is computed for comparison in contrast to tfee our index is found fitting better to the real case according to the tfee index rankings the central area of china has the worst energy efficiency and its total adjustmentof energy consumption amount is over half of china s total regional tfee in china generally improved during the research period except for the western area a u shape relation between the area s tfee and per capita income in the areas of china is found confirming the scenario that energy efficiency eventually improves with economic growth

driving factors of carbon embodied in china s provincial exports in this paper we use the multi regional input output model mrio and logarithm mean divisia index approach to analyze the changes in china s carbon embodied in exports cee at the national and provincial levels the results indicate that the total cee and the cee of 17 provinces including all eastern provinces decreased between 2007 and 2010 the largest decrease in total cee is caused by an input structural effect which decreases the cee of most of the provinces the technique effect arising from changes in provincial carbon intensities causes the second largest decrease in total cee and it effectively reduces the cee of most of the provinces especially the eastern provinces changes in the export composition of most of the provinces also decrease the provincial cee a change in the provincial distribution of exports decreases the cee in 11 provinces on the one hand and increases the cee in 19 provinces on the other hand a change in export volume increases the cee of each province and the whole country but its total effect is evidently lower than the input structural effect and the technique effect c 2015 elsevier b v all rights reserved

native internal migration and the labor market impact of immigration this paper presents a theoretical and empirical study of how immigration influences the joint determination of the wage structure and internal migration behavior for native born workers in local labor markets using data from the 1960 2000 decennial censuses the study shows that immigration is associated with lower in migration rates higher out migration rates and a decline in the growth rate of the native workforce the native migration response attenuates the measured impact of immigration on wages in a local labor market by 40 to 60 per cent depending on whether the labor market is defined at the state or metropolitan area level

do gender and business trainings affect business outcomes experimental evidence from vietnam we use a randomized control trial to evaluate the impact of a business training for female clients of a microfinance institution in northern vietnam and we consider the impact on i business knowledge ii practices and ii outcomes as well as iv firm entry and exit decisions in addition we vary the nature of the intervention by inviting husbands to participate in the trainings for a subsample of our respondents to gauge both short term and medium term effects we combine data from two separate postintervention surveys we find evidence of economically substantive impacts on knowledge practices and outcomes and on the extensive margin entry and exit we also document that it takes time for the downstream outcomes of the trainings to materialize although we find evidence of medium term effects no such evidence exists for the short term inviting husbands to participate in the trainings does not affect any of our knowledge or practice measures but we document weak evidence for different

the impact of entrepreneurship programs on minorities we document the impact of an entrepreneurship training program on startup activity of minorities females and non caucasians we compare entrepreneurial activity between applicants who are accepted into the program with applicants who are program finalists but not accepted we find that the effect of the program is small for minorities in the short run however the effect of the program is more pronounced for minorities likelihood of longer run startup activity whereas the effect on non minorities is small and statistically insignificant we suggest that such programs are most effective for individuals that may otherwise have limited access to entrepreneurial opportunities

returns to capital in microenterprises evidence from a field experiment small and informal firms account for a large share of employment in developing countries the rapid expansion of microfinance services is based on the belief that these firms have productive investment opportunities and can enjoy high returns to capital if given the opportunity however measuring the return to capital is complicated by unobserved factors such as entrepreneurial ability and demand shocks which are likely to be correlated with capital stock the authors use a randomized experiment to overcome this problem and to measure the return to capital for the average microenterprise in their sample regardless of whether they apply for credit they accomplish this by providing cash and equipment grants to small firms in sri lanka and measuring the increase in profits arising from this exogenous positive shock to capital stock after controlling for possible spillover effects the authors find the average real return to capital to be 5 7 percent a month substantially higher than the market interest rate they then examine the heterogeneity of treatment effects to explore whether missing credit markets or missing insurance markets are the most likely cause of the high returns returns are found to vary with entrepreneurial ability and with measures of other sources of cash within the household but not to vary with risk aversion or uncertainty

status caste and the time allocation of women in rural india abstractwe argue that women may be disinclined to participate in market work in the rural areas of india because of family status concerns in a culture that stigmatizes market work by married women we set out a theoretical framework that offers predictions regarding the effects of caste based status concerns on the time allocation of women we then use the all india national sample survey data for the year 2004 5 and the time use survey for six states of india for the year 1998 99 to empirically test these hypotheses after controlling for a host of correlates we find that the ratio of women s market work to men s declines as we move up the caste hierarchy this ratio falls as family wealth rises and the decline is steeper for the higher castes finally the effect on women s market work of higher education is weaker for the higher castes these findings lend support to our theory and to the view that through its emphasis on family status caste plays a pivotal role in undermining the autonomy of wome

minding small change among small firms in kenya abstract many micro enterprises in kenya have low productivity we focus on one particular business decision which may indicate low productivity keeping enough change on hand to break larger bills this is a surprisingly large problem our estimates suggest that the average firm loses approximately 5 8 of total profits because they do not have enough change we conducted two experiments to shed light on why this happens surveying firms weekly about lost sales thereby increasing the salience of change and explicitly informing firms about lost sales we find that both interventions significantly altered change management and reduced lost sales this largely rules out many potential explanations such as the risk of theft or the costs of holding change being too high one explanation consistent with firms response to the survey and information on their lost sales is that firms were not perfectly attentive to change management prior to the interventions

china s energy consumption change from 1987 to 2007 a multi regional structural decomposition analysis abstract increasing use of energy has helped to stimulate china s economy despite central planning china has great differences in economic development energy endowment and energy consumption across its regions this paper uses the structural decomposition approach to uncover the regional disparities in energy consumption from 1987 to 2007 we also examine six possible key factors for the change in energy consumption by region we find that final demand change outpaced efficiency improvements to drive up energy use in all regions between 1987 and 2007 more surprisingly from 2002 to 2007 it appears that changes in production structure enhanced energy consumption in most regions china produced more energy intensive goods for capital investment and export we contend that improving the energy efficiency of key energy intensive sectors would lead a significant decline in energy intensity energy directly or indirectly is flowing from northwest central and north china to coastal regions regional specific policies should be designed to promote production structure change and curb energy demand

livestock asset transfers with and without training evidence from rwanda abstract we present evidence from rwanda s girinka one cow per poor family program that has distributed more than 130 000 livestock asset transfers in the form of cows to the rural poor since 2006 supply side constraints on the program resulted in some beneficiaries receiving complementary training with the cow transfer and other households not receiving such training with their cow we exploit these differences to estimate the additional impact of receiving complementary training with the cow transfer on household s economic outcomes up to six years after having received the livestock asset transfer our results show that even in a setting such as rural rwanda where linkages between farmers and produce markets are weak the provision of training with asset transfers has permanent and economically significant impacts on milk production milk yields from livestock household earnings and asset accumulation the results have important implications for the design of ultra poor livestock asset transfer programs being trialled globally as a means to allow the rural poor to better their economic lives

analysis of the effect and potential of energy conservation in china in this paper a quantitative algorithm for direct and indirect energy savings is developed based on the database analysis of china s energy consumption per gdp in the last two decades the result shows that direct energy savings due to improved energy conversion and end use utilization efficiencies only account for 26 5 of the total energy savings and that indirect energy savings due to increased added value of products product shifts and structure shifts in industries account for 73 5 of the total energy savings factors affecting indirect energy savings are then analyzed and total energy system efficiencies and direct energy savings in 2020 are quantitatively estimated which shows that enlarging indirect energy savings is a more crucial task for china s macro energy conservation in the future the paper suggests that china should pay more attention to indirect energy savings to improve the energy utilization output benefits by increasing the added value of products optimizing product and industry structures and improving production technologies the potential of indirect energy savings in china is more significant compared with developed countries

human and financial capital for microenterprise development evidence from a field and lab experiment microenterprises constitute an important source of employment and developing such enterprises is a key policy concern in most countries but what is the most efficient tool for microenterprise development we study this question in a developing country context tanzania where microenterprises are the source of employment for more than half of the labor force and we report from a field experiment that jointly investigated the importance of a human capital intervention business training and a financial capital intervention business grant using data from three survey rounds a lab experiment and administrative records of the microfinance institution we present evidence on business performance management practices happiness business knowledge and noncognitive abilities our study demonstrates strong effects of the combination of the two interventions on male entrepreneurs while the effects on female entrepreneurs are much more muted the results suggest that long term finance is an important constraint for microfinance entrepreneurs but that business training is essential to transform financial capital into productive investments our study also points to the need for more comprehensive measures to promote the businesses of female entrepreneurs data as supplemental material are available at http dx doi org 10 1287 mnsc 2014 1933 this paper was accepted by john list behavioral economics

the effect of internal migration on local labor markets american cities during the great depression the great depression offers a unique laboratory to investigate the causal impact of migration on local labor markets we use variation in the generosity of new deal programs and extreme weather events to instrument for migrant flows to and from u s cities in migration had little effect on the hourly earnings of existing residents instead in migration prompted some residents to move away and others to lose weeks of work or access to relief jobs for every 10 arrivals we estimate that 1 9 residents moved out 2 1 were prevented from finding a relief job and 1 9 shifted from full time to part time work

industry energy use and structural change a case study of the people s republic of china abstract this paper examines the effects of structural change and improvements in energy intensities of individual industries in aggregate industry energy intensity changes in china during 1980 88 the divisia index is used to decompose the energy intensity effect and structural effect a major finding of this analysis is that the main contribution to changed aggregate energy intensity was from the changes in energy intensities of individual industries during the period structural effects were found to contribute little to the aggregate energy intensity changes