rafmacalaba/datause-encoder-data huggingface dataset:
Active Conflict and Access to
            Education : Evidence from a Series of Conflict-Related
            Shocks in the Republic of Yemen
Using a high-frequency survey in the
            Republic of Yemen, this paper demonstrates how school
            attendance responds to a series of conflict-related shocks.
            First, there are plausibly exogenous changes in violence
            that have limited impacts on school attendance but do affect
            other dimensions of well-being. And second, consequences of
            conflict aside from living in close proximity to violence
            can impact attendance. The importance of a wide variety of
            conflict shocks suggests that an understanding of all shocks
            is needed before attributing the cause of attendance changes
            in such tumultuous settings, and these results have
            implications for the delivery of education assistance in
            conflict settings.
Using Remittance Transaction Data
            for Timely Estimation of the Foreign Worker Population in Malaysia
Malaysia has been grappling with
            understanding how many foreign workers reside in the country
            and thus faces challenges in formulating evidence-based
            foreign worker policies. This paper uses micro-level
            remittance transaction data collected from money transfer
            service providers to estimate the number of foreign workers.
            Most foreign workers remit a large portion of their earnings
            to support family members back home. They are low-income
            earners, sensitive to remittance costs, and opt for money
            transfer service providers to remit money rather than
            regular banks, where transfer services are more expensive.
            Therefore, the remittance data provide a useful source to
            conduct the investigation. Existing estimates range from two
            million to five million foreign workers; our results narrow
            that range to between 2.99 million and 3.16 million foreign
            workers in Malaysia as of 2017-18. The estimated state and
            nationality distributions of foreign workers are consistent
            with the Ministry of Home Affairs data, lending support to
            the validity of the estimates. Nevertheless, the Bank Negara
            Malaysia remittance data could potentially underestimate the
            number of workers in states with low access to money service
            providers and nationalities that have access to alternative
            money transfer mechanisms such as commercial banking and
            informal transfer channels.
Shoring Up Economic Refugees :
            Venezuelan Migrants in the Ecuadoran Labor Market
Ecuador became the third largest
            receiver of the 4.3 million Venezuelans who left their
            country in the last five years, hosting around 10 percent of
            them. Little is known about the characteristics of these
            migrants and their labor market outcomes. This paper fills
            this gap by analyzing a new large survey (EPEC). On average,
            Venezuelan workers are highly skilled and have high rates of
            employment, compared with Ecuadorans. However, their
            employment is of much lower quality, characterized by low
            wages and high rates of informality and temporality.
            Venezuelans have experienced significant occupational
            downgrading, relative to their employment prior to
            emigration. As a result, despite their high educational
            attainment, Venezuelans primarily compete for jobs with the
            least skilled and more economically vulnerable Ecuadoran
            workers. Our simulations suggest that measures that allow
            Venezuelans to obtain employment that matches their skills,
            such as facilitating the conversion of education
            credentials, would increase Ecuador's GDP between 1.6
            and 1.9 percent and alleviate the pressure on disadvantaged
            native workers. We also show that providing work permits to
            Venezuelan workers would substantially reduce their rates of
            informality and increase their average earnings.
The Effects of Digital-Technology
            Adoption on Productivity and Factor Demand : Firm-level
            Evidence from Developing Countries
This paper presents firm-level estimates
            of revenue-based total factor productivity premiums of
            manufacturing firms adopting digital technology in 82
            developing economies over 2002-19. The paper estimates
            productivity using the control function approach and
            assuming an endogenous revenue-based total factor
            productivity process, which is a function of multiple
            firm-choice variables. It estimates the effects of digital
            technology adoption, learning by exporting, and managerial
            experience on revenue-based total factor productivity and
            factor demand. The results reject the 0 hypothesis of an
            exogenous revenue-based total factor productivity process,
            in favor of one in which digital technology adoption, along
            with the other choice variables, affects revenue-based total
            factor productivity and factor demand. The estimated
            premiums are positive for 67.3 (email adoption), 54.6
            (website adoption), 59.4 (learning by exporting), and 60.6
            (managerial experience) percent of the sample. The
            probability-adjusted median (log) revenue-based total factor
            productivity premium associated with email adoption is 1.6
            percent and that of website adoption is 2.2 percent, with
            the latter being higher than the premiums corresponding to
            exporting and managerial experience. On average, changes in
            digital technology adoption, email, and website are labor
            and capital augmenting. The paper also explores the role of
            complementarities among the firm choice variables.
What Can the Service Delivery
            Indicator Surveys Tell Us about COVID-19 Preparedness
To aid national and international
            efforts to support countries in enhancing their pandemic
            preparedness in the face of COVID-19, this paper draws from
            the World Bank's Service Delivery Indicator surveys to
            highlight key aspects of health service preparedness in
            Kenya, Sierra Leone, and Tanzania. The results of this
            analysis paint a highly variable picture. At least 10
            percent of lower-level facilities in all three countries
            have inpatient care capacity, suggesting that these
            lower-level facilities could help absorb surges in patient
            flow. Less than half of the facilities in the three
            countries have a fixed or mobile phone and less than a third
            have internet access, suggesting a likely challenge in
            communication and timely sharing of essential information.
            Concerningly, less than half of the facilities have
            appropriate handwashing facilities for patients, with even
            lower rates in rural areas. Between 80 and 95 percent of the
            facilities have a thermometer to diagnose fever, but
            availability of a thermometer, stethoscope, and blood
            pressure cuff together is variable (ranging from almost 90
            percent of the facilities in Tanzania to less than 65
            percent in Sierra Leone). The paper concludes by
            highlighting key innovations for future surveys to improve
            measurement of pandemic preparedness.
The State of Land Use in Northern
            Nigeria : A Landsat-Based Mapping Framework
This study developed a land cover and
            land use mapping framework specifically designed for
            agricultural systems in the Sudan-Sahel region. The mapping
            approach extracts information from inter- and intra-annual
            vegetation dynamics from dense stacks of Landsat 8 images.
            The framework was applied to create a 30-meter spatial
            resolution land use map focusing on the 2015 agricultural
            landscapes in northern Nigeria. The map provides up-to-date
            information with a high level of spatial and thematic
            detail, resulting in a more precise characterization of
            agriculture in the region. The map reveals that agriculture
            is the main land use in the region. Arable land represents
            on average 52.5 percent of the area, which is higher than
            the reported national average for Nigeria (38.4 percent).
            Irrigated agriculture covers nearly 2.2 percent of the total
            area, reaching nearly 20 percent of the cultivated land when
            traditional floodplain agriculture systems are included,
            which is above the reported national average (0.63 percent).
            There is significant variability in land use in the region.
            This study demonstrates the feasibility of multitemporal
            medium-resolution remote sensing data to provide detailed,
            up-to-date information on agricultural systems in the arid
            and sub-arid landscapes of the Sahel region.
Capital Market Financing and Firm Growth
This paper studies whether there is a
            connection between finance and growth at the firm level. It
            employs a new dataset of 150,165 equity and bond issuances
            around the world, matched with income and balance sheet data
            for 62,653 listed firms in 65 countries over 1990-2016.
            Three main patterns emerge from the analyses. First, firms
            that choose to issue in capital markets use the funds raised
            to grow by enhancing their productive capabilities,
            increasing their tangible and intangible capital and the
            number of employees. Growth accelerates as firms raise
            funds. Second, the faster growth is more pronounced among
            firms that are more likely to face tighter financing
            constraints, namely, small, young, and high-R&D firms.
            Third, capital market issuances are associated with faster
            growth among firms located in countries with more developed
            capital markets relative to banks. Capital markets are also
            comparatively effective at allowing financially constrained
            firms to raise capital.
Mobile Money and Investment by Women
            Businesses in Sub-Saharan Africa
This study connects two important
            findings in Sub-Saharan Africa. First, digital technologies
            such as mobile money have become widespread and have
            increased investment by businesses, especially in East
            Africa. Second, women-owned business in the region
            significantly lag their male counterparts in capital
            investments. Using data for 16 Sub-Saharan African
            economies, the study connects the two findings by exploring
            whether mobile money use by women-owned firms increases
            their investment. The findings indicate that the positive
            relationship between mobile money use and investment is
            largely driven by women-owned firms and is statistically
            insignificant for men-owned firms. Potential channels of
            these effects are explored. Women-owned firms that use
            mobile money to transact with suppliers are more likely to
            invest. Mobile money also seems to facilitate greater
            provision of customer credit and generally greater demand
            for more credit by women-owned firms. Such patterns are not
            observed for men-owned firms.
Crop Yield Convergence across
            Districts in India's Poorest State : Crop Yield
            Convergence across Districts in India's Poorest State
Bihar, India's poorest state,
            witnessed impressive yield growth in each of its three
            principal crops over 2005–17. This paper examines whether a
            convergence in district yields accompanied the improvement
            in yields at the state level, thereby reducing regional
            inequalities in land productivity. The convergence test
            allows the idiosyncratic element of productivity to be
            time-varying, thus allowing yields to diverge in some
            interim phases. District rice yields appear to be converging
            towards a common growth path, but wheat and maize yields
            have been diverging. The sub-period analysis shows a trend
            of divergence for all crops going forward. The analysis also
            identifies district clubs, which are converging to similar
            steady states. The club classification transcends
            agro-climatic boundaries, indicating a need for policy
            action to aid yield growth in lagging districts. Finally,
            there is no evidence that the divergence in yields was
            driven by a divergence in credit allocation, highlighting
            the limitations of a macro credit-driven policy. Credit
            supply might not be enough when there are structural snags
            in the availability of direct agricultural inputs.
Structural Change and Productivity
            Growth in Guinea
This paper documents that structural
            change positively contributed to labor productivity growth
            in Guinea during 2006-15. However, the contribution of
            structural change to productivity growth was modest (about
            one percentage point per year on average), because labor
            moved from agriculture, the least productive sector, into
            other relatively low-productivity activities, such as
            wholesale and retail trade and community services. Although
            such services are more productive than agriculture, they are
            low-productivity activities because of the high level of
            informality. The paper also finds that the contribution of
            structural change to productivity growth has declined over
            time, mainly due to the increased labor market rigidity,
            lower competitive real exchange rate, declining human
            capital, and weaker government effectiveness. The paper
            provides a discussion of the policy implications of the findings.
Demand-Side Constraints in
            Development : The Role of Market Size, Trade, and (In)Equality
What is the pathway to development in a
            world marked by rising economic nationalism and less
            international integration? This paper answers this question
            within a framework that emphasizes the role of demand-side
            constraints on national development, which is identified
            with sustained poverty reduction. In this framework,
            development is linked to the adoption of an increasing
            returns to scale technology by imperfectly competitive firms
            that need to pay the fixed setup cost of switching to that
            technology. Sustained poverty reduction is measured as a
            continuous decline in the share of the population living
            below $1.90/day purchasing power parity in 2011 US dollars
            over a five year period. This outcome is affected in a
            statistically significant and economically meaningful way by
            domestic market size, which is measured as function of the
            income distribution, and international market size, which is
            measured as a function of legally-binding provisions to
            international trade agreements, including the General
            Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, the World Trade Organization
            and 279 preferential trade agreements. Counterfactual
            estimates suggest that, in the absence of international
            integration, the average resident of a low or lower-middle
            income country does not live in a market large enough to
            experience sustained poverty reduction. Domestic
            redistribution targeted towards generating a larger middle
            class can partially compensate for the lack of an
            international market.
Expansionary Fiscal Austerity: New
            International Evidence
The expansionary fiscal contraction
            (EFC) hypothesis states that fiscal austerity can increase
            output or consumption when a country is under heavy debt
            burdens because it sends positive signal about the
            country's solvency situation and long-term economic
            wellbeing. Empirical tests of this hypothesis have suffered
            from identification concerns due to data sources and
            empirical methodology. Using a sample of OECD countries
            between 1978 and 2014, this paper combines new IMF narrative
            data and the proxy structural Vector Auto-regression (SVAR)
            method to examine whether fiscal austerities can be
            expansionary when debt levels are high. Fiscal austerities
            are measured as 1) narrative fiscal shocks and 2) structural
            shocks from a proxy SVAR. Additionally, this paper uses a
            model-based approach to determine the cutoff debt level
            beyond which EFC is expected to be observed. This paper
            finds empirical evidence in support of the EFC hypothesis
            for OECD countries: results for output are driven by changes
            in tax rates and are robust to how one defines a high-debt
            regime and how one measures austerity.
Job Search and Hiring with Two-Sided
            Limited Information about Workseekers~^!!^ Skills : Job
            Search and Hiring with Two-Sided Limited Information about
            Workseekers' Skills
This paper presents field experimental
            evidence that limited information about workseekers~^!!^
            skills distorts both firm and workseeker behavior. Assessing
            workseekers~^!!^ skills, giving workseekers their assessment
            results, and helping them to credibly share the results with
            firms increases workseekers~^!!^ employment and earnings. It
            also aligns their beliefs and search strategies more closely
            with their skills. Giving assessment results only to
            workseekers has similar effects on beliefs and search, but
            smaller effects on employment and earnings. Giving
            assessment results only to firms increases callbacks. These
            patterns are consistent with two-sided information
            frictions, a new finding that can inform the design of
            information-provision mechanisms.
Invitations, Incentives, and
            Conditions : A Randomized Evaluation of Demand-Side
            Interventions for Health Screenings in Armenia
The study is a randomized controlled
            trial that investigates the impact of four demand-side
            interventions on health screening for diabetes and
            hypertension among Armenian adults ages 35-68 who had not
            been tested in the last 12 months. The interventions are
            personal invitations from a physician (intervention group
            1), personal invitations with information about peer
            screening behavior (intervention group 2), a labeled but
            unconditional cash transfer in the form of a pharmacy
            voucher (intervention group 3), and a conditional cash
            transfer in the form of a pharmacy voucher (intervention
            group 4). Compared with the control group in which only 3.5
            percent of participants went for both screenings during the
            study period, interventions 1 to 3 led to a significant
            increase in the screening rate of about 15 percentage points
            among participants. The highest intervention impact was
            measured among recipients in intervention group 4, whose
            uptake of screening on both tests increased by 31.2
            percentage points. The levels of cost-effectiveness of
            intervention groups 1, 2, and 4 are similar while for
            intervention group 3 it is about twice more expensive per
            additional person screened.
Hide and Protect : A Role of Global
            Financial Secrecy in Shaping Domestic Institutions
This paper reviews the literature that
            explores the drivers and effects of financial secrecy on
            emerging economies. It shows that most of the research on
            financial secrecy has been focused on issues of tax
            avoidance, neglecting the problems of institutional
            arbitrage that go beyond taxation issues. The paper
            discusses the limits of the institutionalist paradigm that
            treats businesses solely as rule-takers and calls for more
            attention to business agency and responsibility. Discussions
            about corporate social responsibility in emerging economies
            should incorporate thinking about the potential role that
            businesses, and especially big corporations, could play in
            promoting more effective institutions at home. Further
            research is needed to understand the political and
            institutional effects of global financial secrecy at the
            domestic level. The paper suggests some promising avenues
            for future research as well as new items to be included on
            the policy-making agenda in relation to financial secrecy.
Internationally Linked Firms,
            Integration Reforms and Productivity : Evidence from Pakistan
This paper examines productivity
            dynamics and drivers for Pakistani firms listed in the stock
            exchange (publicly listed firms) over 2012-17. It relies on
            policy and outcome measures of integration in upstream
            merchandise and services sectors, to assess their impact on
            productivity downstream. The paper presents three main
            findings. First, the productivity of publicly listed firms
            remained stagnant over the period, in line with macro-level
            indicators for Pakistan. Second, foreign-owned or exporting
            firms are more productive than domestic-owned or
            domestic-oriented firms. Foreign investors target more
            productive firms, and their productivity grows after being
            acquired. Exporters tend to exhibit productivity growth
            after becoming exporters. Third, increased import duties on
            intermediates, or reduced levels of foreign direct
            investment in upstream services sectors, are associated with
            decreases in the total factor productivity of firms
            downstream. Gains from lower input tariffs accrue to those
            that do not secure duty exemption schemes --
            domestic-oriented firms or smaller exporters. Gains from
            upstream services foreign direct investment accrue mostly to
            firms that are further from the productivity frontier. Taken
            together, these results suggest that productivity growth in
            Pakistan would benefit from increased exposure of upstream
            sectors to global markets.