Governments in many countries are implementing social distancing measures to reduce the spread of COVID-19, yet there is limited evidence about the effectiveness of these measures in low-income contexts. This is particularly true of travel restrictions/lockdowns; this, plus school closures, are likely to have major labor market implications, and potentially differential effects by gender. The…
Gender Effects of COVID-19: Evidence from the Kenya Life Panel Survey
What Can Online Vacancies Tell Us About Labor Market Conditions in Lower-Income Countries? Evidence from India
Over the last decade, the rapid diffusion of internet technologies in lower-income countries has changed how employers and workers interact in the labor market. While the initial boom in online recruitment focused on higher-wage occupations, there now exist online search and matching services for lower-wage occupations, from domestic work to entry-level retail jobs. Harnessing these…
Gender Differences in the Effects of the ‘Great Lockdown’on Time Use
This research will address whether and how the coronavirus pandemic exacerbates barriers to gender parity in developing countries by asymmetrically affecting time use for men and women. The effects of COVID-19 are likely to differ by gender (Alon et al., 2020), but the nature and extent of those differences are uncertain. The study, therefore, proposes…
Migration, Changing Residence Patterns, and Covid-19 in India
Informal insurance through family members and temporary migration are among the most important ways that individuals in low-income countries mitigate economic shocks. Covid-19makes these traditional means of informal insurance socially costly. Temporary or permanent migrants respond to the negative economic shock of the pandemic by returning home to co-reside with family members and risk spreading…
Meet Your Future: Job Search Effort and Aspirations of Young Jobseekers
The Meet You Future Project (MYF) is an ongoing RCT designed in partnership with BRAC Uganda to investigate the relative importance of several barriers to quality employment that students face when transitioning from the educational sector into labor markets characterized by high levels of informality. The experimental setting is that of Vocational Training Institutes (VTIs) in…
Characterizing Urban Labor Market Effects of COVID and Speeding Recovery Through a Job Search Platform
The COVID-19 crisis has triggered unemployment worldwide. In developing countries, the effects are expected to be large (Mubarak and Howell 2020; Saleh and Cash 2020; Dingel and Neiman 2020); however, better data is needed to understand (1) who is most affected; (2) which job losses are expected to be temporary versus permanent, and (3) how…
The Impact of COVID19 Pandemic on the Small Firms in Developing Countries
COVID19 has paralysed the world over the last few months. To limit the spread of the disease, many countries adopted lockdown and social distancing measures. While these measures are seen as vital in containing the disease, they have also precipitated an unprecedented economic crisis. The crisis is hitting low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) harder on…
Working Together or Never: Women’s Labor Supply Externalities and the Unemployment Trap
When social networks generate redistributive pressures, labor supply decisions are undertaken in a social context. Individuals who optimize labor supply do so with the understanding that some of their earnings may be subject to taxation within the network; if they are capable of avoiding this tax by not working, then labor supply will be distorted…
The Impact of Subsidized Access to Nurseries and Employment Services on Mothers’ Labor Market Outcomes and Child Development in Egypt
There are three main explanations as to why female labor force participation, globally, remains low: (1) women’s high opportunity cost of time (2) weak labor demand and (3) restrictive gender norms. The research team will test aspects of all three constraints on FLFP in a low-income context in Egypt. They will specifically answer the following…
Seasonal Migration to Alleviate Seasonal Poverty: A Randomized Social Experiment in Myanmar
Much of the world is heavily dependent on rain-fed agriculture. As a result, the rural economy is highly seasonal. In some areas during the lean season, work opportunities become scant, wages decline, and food prices rise, leading to seasonal deprivation. Seasonal labor migration is one of the coping strategies households use to smooth against this…