rafmacalaba/datause-encoder-data huggingface dataset:
issue area and sector. Organizations can coordinate to withdraw support from politicians who overstep constitutional boundaries and can provide competition to firms that capture excessive rents. The proliferation of perpetually lived organizations also creates a world in which “impersonal” relations predominate. These organizations are crucial for the development of a shared belief system in which people are treated equally and according to impersonal laws.

Although NWW repeatedly emphasize the importance of beliefs and identities in open access orders, their conceptualization of beliefs is individualistic rather than intersubjective. Early on, they clarify that they use the word “society” as shorthand for the aggregate of the individuals, rather than a causal agent in itself: “We are aware that societies are not actors. _Societies_ do not deal with anything; individuals do” (NWW p. 13, fn; emphasis in the original). Although their “Note on Beliefs” acknowledges that they do not explain the origins of beliefs, it is clear from their discussion that individuals generate beliefs when they compare received explanations (from their parents and schools) of how the world works with their experience of how it works, and that common beliefs arise from the largely independent and simultaneous cognitions of all (or most) individuals in a society: The two main channels of belief formation are individual experience and education. Human beings are genetically programmed to learn in both ways. Human cultures, in part, are common information passed on through education, whether formal in the sense of classrooms or informal in the sense of parents and others teaching social norms to children. Neither way of forming beliefs is completely reliable, in part, because the beliefs we draw from experience are inaccurate models of the world around us. (NWW p. 28) In this account, belief systems are purely cognitive phenomena in which aggregates of individuals come to develop “common information” and shared “models” of external causation. The notion that the formation and expression of an individual’s beliefs requires a shared set of background meanings, and that coordinated social practices give rise to shared background meanings, are foreign to this account. Finally, despite their repeated emphasis on the role of beliefs in history, they provide almost no direct evidence that beliefs have, in fact, played a causal role in the development and maintenance of open access orders. At one point, when arguing that even mature natural states, such as Korea and Venezuela, may not exhibit societal beliefs consistent with open access, they point to polls showing that many individuals in those countries would accept military coups in certain circumstances and believe that authoritarians 16
inherit their higher ability, producing a spurious correlation between child cognitive ability and SES. There is a large literature on this issue, mainly from industrialized countries, that relies on studies of twins, siblings, or adopted children to tease apart the effects of SES and innate ability (Plomin, 1994; Petrill, 2003).<sup>14</sup> The evidence to date indicates that both genetic and environmental factors contribute to child cognitive ability, and that maternal warmth and socioeconomic status are among the environmental factors that are important (Petrill and DeaterDeckard, 2004).

Second, the fact that cognitive development is a cumulative process complicates the interpretation of the associations, especially for time-varying variables. A finding, for example, that low levels of hemoglobin are negatively associated with test scores of 4-year-old children would not necessarily indicate that this is a “critical age” at which iron deficiency has a large effect on development. The reason is that low hemoglobin at age 4 is likely to be correlated with low levels of hemoglobin at earlier ages (which have not been measured), and the association at age 4 could reflect the effects of iron deficiency at earlier ages. Complete histories of hemoglobin levels (and of the other time-varying factors we observe) would be required to identify “critical periods”.

Third, it may be that the treatment that children receive from their parents is affected by their cognitive ability. Economic models predict that parents adjust investments in “inputs” to child development in response to the perceived ability of the child (Becker and Tomes, 1976). These investments could be “compensatory”—children with slow cognitive development could receive more and better food, or extra parental attention—or “complementary”—more resources could be devoted to the brightest children. In either case, associations between the measures of child health and parenting and test scores could in part be driven by parents’ responses to their children’s cognitive ability. Again, with only one cross-section of data it is not possible to determine whether this is so.

# **IV. Results**

<u>Nonparametric analyses: We begin with a descriptive analysis of how TVIP scores vary</u> across children of different ages. These results identify features of the data we will investigate in

> 14 Only 336 of the 2811 households represented in our sample have more than one child between the ages of 36 and 71 months, a sample size too small to estimate models with sibling effects. There are even fewer households with multiple children within the younger age group (50 households) or older age group (22 households).

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young adults who were drawn into construction jobs in the wake of China’s recent stimulusfueled infrastructure construction boom, and who typically sought lucrative work after completing middle school education, may find it difficult to acquire new skills as construction slows (Du and Cai 2013). Reducing the permanent component of inequality within urban areas and improving the ability of future migrants to shift to more skill-intensive occupations may both be facilitated by reducing the costs of high school education for rural students capable of continuing their education beyond middle school.

# **6. References**

- Appleton, Simon, John Hoddinott and John Knight. 1996. “Primary Education as an Input into Post-primary Education: A Neglected Benefit.” _Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics_ 58(1): 211-19.

- Baum, Christopher F., Mark E. Schaffer, and Steven Stillman. 2003. “Instrumental Variables and GMM: Estimation and Testing.” _Stata Journal_ 3(1): 1-31.

- Beine, Michel, Frederic Docquier and Hillel Rapoport. 2008. “Brain Drain and Human Capital Formation in Developing Countries: Winners and Losers.” _Economic Journal_ 118(528): 631-52.

- Benjamin, Dwayne, Loren Brandt and John Giles. 2005. “The Evolution of Income Inequality in Rural China.” _Economic Development and Cultural Change_ 53(4): 769-824.

- Brandt, Loren, Scott Rozelle and Matthew Turner. 2004. “Local Government Behavior and Property Right Formation in Rural China.” _Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics_ , 160(4): 627-62.

- Cai, Fang, Albert Park and Yaohui Zhao. 2008. “The Chinese Labor Market in the Reform Era.” In _China’s Great Economic Transformation_ , ed. Loren Brandt and Thomas Rawski, 167214. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

- Cameron, Colin A. and Douglas L. Miller. 2011. “Robust Inference with Clustered Data,” in A. Ullah and D.E. Giles eds., _Handbook of Empirical Economics and Finance_ , CRC Press.

- Cameron, Colin A. and Douglas L. Miller. 2015. “A Practitioner’s Guide to Cluster-Robust Inference.” _Journal of Human Resources_ 50(2): 317-372.

- Carrington, William, Enrica Detragiache and Tara Vishnawath. 1996. “Migration with Endogenous Moving Costs.” _American Economic Review_ 86(4): 909-930.

- Chen, Joyce. 2013. “Identifying non-cooperative behavior among spouses: Child outcomes in Migrant Sending Households,” _Journal of Development Economics_ 100(1): 1-18.

- de Brauw, Alan, and John Giles.  2006.  “Migrant Opportunity and the Educational Attainment of Youth in Rural China.”  IZA Discussion Paper 2326.

- Du, Yang and Fang Cai. 2013. “Do the Recent Labor Market Changes Negatively Affect Schooling?” _China and the World Economy_ 21(2): 1–18.

- Du, Yang, and John Giles. 2006. “The Impact of City-Level Labor Market Shocks to

29
# **Debt Relief for Households in Developing Economies**<sup>*</sup>

_Prepared for the Oxford Review of Economic Policy_ Sasha Indarte<sup>†</sup> Martin Kanz<sup>‡</sup>

**Keywords:** Debt relief, debt forbearance, personal bankruptcy, moral hazard **JEL: G51, G18, G21, D15, H81**

> *This version: June 24, 2024. We are grateful to Nicolás De Roux, Muhammad Meki, Simon Quinn, an anonymous referee, and numerous seminar participants for helpful comments and suggestions. Radhika Kaul provided outstanding research assistance. The opinions expressed in this paper do not necessarily represent the views of the World Bank, its executive directors, or the countries they represent.

> † The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania, Email: `aindarte@wharton.upenn.edu` .

> ‡World Bank and CEPR, Email: `mkanz@worldbank.org` .
noteworthy. First, there was no difference between treatment and control schools in the rate of teacher certification before the start of the experiment in 2009. Second, the intervention introduced a sharp increase in the fraction of teachers admitted to the certification process in treatment schools in 2009, even as the trend in control schools remained constant. Third, the gap in fraction of admitted teachers narrowed over time, as the eligible teachers in the control schools gained access to the certification process at a "business as usual" rate. Thus, the difference in the fraction of teachers admitted to the certification process across treatment and control schools is higher at the time of the baseline survey (Y0) than at the end of Y2 and Y3.

As described earlier, teachers entered the certification process at the start of each school year, completed the process over the course of the year, got certified by the end of the year, and started receiving their payments at the start of the next year. Thus, at the time of the baseline there was no difference between treatment and control schools in the fraction of teachers who were certified or who had received the extra certification allowance. However, both indicators had increased sharply by the end of Y2 and Y3 (Figure IV).

Table III - Panel A shows the differences in Figures 3 and 4, along with tests of equality. In the first year, the share of teachers in treatment schools who had entered the certification process was 33 percentage points higher than (or more than double) that in the control group, while no difference had yet appeared in the fraction certified or paid the certification allowance. At the end of Y2 and Y3, the difference in the fraction of teachers who had entered the certification process falls to 17 and 7 percentage points respectively (since the control schools catch up over time). At the end of Y2 (Y3), the fraction of teachers in treatment schools who report being certified is 23 (14) percentage points higher, and the fraction who report being paid the certification allowance is 28 (23) percentage points higher.

Note that the difference in the fraction of teachers who are paid their certification allowance is higher than the difference in the fraction who are certified (at the end of both Y2 and Y3). This is as expected; many eligible teachers in the control schools would have entered the certification process at the start of Y2 and Y3 and then been certified at the end of Y2 and Y3 respectively, but would have started getting paid their allowances only at the start of the next school year. These teachers will therefore report being certified but will not yet have started getting paid their allowance at the time of the Y2 and Y3 surveys, respectively. On the other hand, teachers in treatment schools who gained access to the certification process at the start of Y1 will have completed certification by the 16
form that serves as a baseline survey, providing demographic information, field of study, university, prior work experience, job type preferences, and reservation wage.

Table 6 provides some summary characteristics of the candidates. 94 percent are university students, although only 68 percent are completing bachelor’s degrees, with the rest typically obtaining 2-year diplomas. Average age is 22.5, and 53 percent of the sample is male. The most common major is accounting and business (44%), following by engineering (12%), and computing and IT (9%). The mean self-reported reservation monthly wage of 346 JD for males and 287 JD for females are in line with the earnings of graduates in Table 4. However, the expected time to find a job is only 5.2 months, which suggests overconfidence as this is much lower than the averages for educated youth reported in the introduction. Almost all students say they are interested in being matched to both jobs in their field of study, as well as to general jobs. However, when we asked them specifically about a list of 9 less prestigious jobs (listed in Appendix 2), the mean individual was only willing to work in 2.6 of them. In particular, only 3 percent said they were willing to work as waiters, 13 percent in retail, and 14 percent in outdoor sales, with fewer females than males saying they are willing to work in these jobs.

Our goal in recruiting firms for this second experiment was to work with firms that had a range of entry-level positions, including both high and low prestige jobs. We wanted to work with a range of firms with actual job openings. Firms were identified from databases of larger firms, as well as from firms that had participated in previous interventions or surveys. They were screened as being likely to hire fresh graduates in the next few months. Each firm was met with individually, and given a short packet of information that would explain Yalla Watheefa to them. They were told this was a pilot program to help match firms with entry-level job openings to fresh graduates, and that we were using it to help understand the difficulties firms face in finding the right candidates, as well as understanding how graduates decide which jobs to work in.

The resulting sample consists of 33 firms with 51 job vacancies. Some vacancies were for more than one worker in that job, so in total these firms were seeking to fill 178 positions. Appendix Table 3 details the industry breakdown of these firms, with the firms being distributed among 12 different sectors, with no one industry dominating. The sample consists of 14 small firms, 9 medium-sized firms, and 10 large firms. Appendix Table 4 details the job openings, and whether or not we define them as low prestige for experimental purposes. High prestige job openings 20
school or university, rather than to inordinately "high" earnings for those who have completed exactly the last year of schooling within a given level.

Two other features of the estimated sheepskin effects in the Philippines are worth noting. First, Tables 3 and 5, and Figure 3 all show that the estimated sheepskin effects in the Philippines do not appear to be the result of a particularly small increase in earnings for those who have all-but-the-last year of schooling within a given level (that is, people with 5, 9, or 14 years of education), something which has been argued for the United States (Park 1994).21 Second, there is no evidence that sheepskin effects diminish with experience in the Philippines. In Figure 4, I present results based on an estimation of equation (3) above for the full sample of men. Each point on a graph corresponds to the expected earnings for a given combination of education and experience, while the vertical lines correspond to six years of education (completed primary) and ten years of education (completed secondary). The results, which can be quite noisy because of the small sample sizes in some cells, show no clear pattern in the relationship between sheepskin effects and experience: The wage premia associated with completion of the last year of university are .504, .374, .387, .213, .355, .488, .180, .240, -.010, and 1.083 for the first through tenth experience cohorts.<sup>22</sup> 21 As noted above, the results based on the sample of male siblings are particularly confusing because the _largest_ wage premium is associated with the all-but-last year of university.

> 22 Belman and Heywood (1997) suggest that sheepskin effects in the United States appear to become attenuated with experience, although there is no clear evidence of such attenuation in the results presented by Heckman, Layne-Farrar, and Todd (1996, pp. 585-89) using the 1970, 1980, and 1990 US Censuses. Another way of estimating the effect of experience on credentials, suggested to me by Harold Alderman, would interact the dummy variables D6, DIO, and D15 in the discontinuous spline specification with experience. The results from such an estimation strategy show that the coefficients on these interactions tend to be significantly negative for graduation from primary school and secondary school, and significantly positive for graduation from university. Note that the experience variable, as constructed, is simply a function of age and education. Unfortunately, the 1998 APIS does not include questions about the amount of time a worker has spent in his current job, which might be more relevant for these calculations.

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MOZAMBIQUE’S INFRASTRUCTURE: A CONTINENTAL PERSPECTIVE

**Table 5. Cargo and passengers transported along Mozambique’s railways**

|**Type**|**Year**||<br>|**CFM**<br>||**Beira Railway**|**Nacala**<br>**Ril**|**Total**|
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|||**Goba**|**R. Garcia**|**Limpopo**|**Subtotal**||**away**||
||2005|50|180|230|460|175|128|763|
|**Cargo transport**<br>**illi t**|2006|45|170|240|455|205|120|780|
|**(mon onne-**<br>**km)**|2007|40|177|237|454|157|127|738|
||2008|52|226|220|498|81|115|694|
||2005|n.a.|60|60|120|5|180|305|
|**Passenger**<br>**tt illi**|2006|n.a.|40|75|115|3|210|328|
|**ranspor (mon**<br>**passenger-km)**|2007|n.a.|16|21|37|3|66|106|
||2008|n.a.|24|23|47|2|64|113|

_Source:_ CFM 2006; 2008. n.a. = Not <u>applicable.</u> These trends might reflect the deterioration of rolling stock, which does not allow for the system to respond to increasing demand. This is particularly the case on the Machipanda line, which suffered years of neglect during which profits were seen at the expense of deferred maintenance, putting the line in need of a massive and urgent track rehabilitation as well as refurbishment and renovation of the stock.

Mozambican railways also need to improve wagon capacity to be able to respond to growing traffic demand from the hinterland. In the case of the lines managed by CFM, out of the 2,000 existing wagons only 600 are operating. But in 2009 CFM rolled out an ambitious plan to rehabilitate locomotives and 670 wagons. New wagons will add capacity to transport minerals and other cargo to and from the countries of the hinterland (Zimbabwe and Zambia predominantly). Meanwhile, ongoing investments on the Ressano Garcia Line, in particular the rehabilitation of the most critical sections, reduced the number of derailments per week from seven in 2006 to two in 2008.

The lines under concession have been only partially successful. The concessions were granted to promote the modernization of the systems and increase their performance; to attract the resources needed to finance investments in infrastructure, equipment, information technology, and maintenance; and to generate an additional source of returns for CFM and the government. But CFM has had to finance the rehabilitation of assets under concession, such as the Sena Line in 2008. Also, like in most African countries, the passenger services are highly unprofitable in Mozambique, with 85 percent of the costs being subsidized by CFM (CFM 2006). The development of passenger traffic along the Sena line is also seriously limited by the very small number of stations; additional stations that were to be added under the concession agreement have not been built.

# Ports

Six of Mozambique’s seven seaports are operating with the involvement of the private sector, which positions Mozambique as a country with a relatively high level of private sector involvement in the port system. In 1998 the management and operation of the general cargo and terminals of the Beira port was 16
is particularly relevant for women above the age of 25 years.

Taken together, these results highlight the importance of understanding the differential effects of different of on and educational types exposure refugees’ well-being development, especially with regards to gender-specific and age-specific considerations. Such insights can inform policymakers and humanitarian efforts aimed at supporting refugees’ successful integration and well-being.

# **References**

- Aiken, Emily L., Guadalupe Bedoya, Joshua E. Blumenstock and Aidan Coville. 2023. “Program targeting with machine learning and mobile phone data: Evidence from an anti-poverty intervention in Afghanistan.” <u>Journal</u> of Development Economics 161:103016.

- Alesina, Alberto and Eliana La Ferrara. 2002. “Who trusts others?” <u>Journal</u> of Public Economics 85(2):207–234.

- Alvi-Aziz, Hayat. 2008. “A progress report on women’s education in post-Taliban Afghanistan.” International <u>Journal</u> of Lifelong Education 27(2):169–178.

- Amnesty. 2004. “Women in Afghanistan: The Back Story.”.

- **URL:** _https://www.amnesty.org.uk/womens-rights-afghanistan-history_

- Amnesty International. 2023. “Afghanistan 2022.” Amnesty International .

- **URL:** _https://www.amnesty.org/en/location/asia-and-the-pacific/south-asia/afghanistan/reportafghanistan/_

- AREU. 2016. “The Political Economy Of Education and Health Service Delivery In Afghanistan.” Afghanistan Research and Evaluation Unit .

- **URL:** _https://www.refworld.org/docid/56b1b2cf4.html_

- Bauer, Michal, Alessandra Cassar, Julie Chytilov ́a and Joseph Henrich. 2014. “War’s En-

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