Research

Working Papers

1. Performance Gains from Gender Match in Higher Education:  Evidence from a Setting with Entrenched Gender Stereotypes (Under Review)

Worldwide, women are severely underrepresented in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) education, developing countries in particular. This study sheds light on whether female college students in a male-dominated STEM course like economics benefit academically from being taught by female instructors in a setting where gender stereotypes are an entrenched social phenomenon. I use a novel and confidential administrative dataset from a renowned economics program in Bangladesh to show that when matched with female teachers, female students gain in terms of grade performance, as well as longer-term outcomes such as degree completion time and the likelihood of enrolling into an economics master’s program.  The quasi-random allocation of students to mandatory courses, with no scope for students to select the courses or instructors, addresses the self-selection concerns. Comparing the test scores of the blindly and non-blindly graded exams for the same course, I rule out the explanation that the gain from gender-matching is driven by gender preference in teachers' assessment. I find that the benefit of matching increases with female teachers' rank, experience, and academic qualifications. I show suggestive evidence that female teachers' effectiveness in teaching female students is an important channel, aside from the oft-cited role model effect, through which same-sex teacher assignments improve female students' academic achievements.  (Link to the full paper)

2. Effects of Physician Supply on Health Outcomes: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Rural Bangladesh (with Nirman Saha) 

Abstract: While there has been a marked improvement in the health outcomes of the general population in developing countries in recent years, meeting people's health needs in remote and rural areas remains a key challenge. The shortage of qualified physicians in rural areas, a common feature in most low- and middle-income countries, has often been touted as one of the most important underlying factors. In this paper, we assess whether an increased supply of physicians in rural areas improves health outcomes. Under a unique intervention commenced in Bangladesh in 2013, the government recruited around 6,000 physicians through a highly qualified exam-- an increase of more than 25 percent of physicians' existing stocks. We use the variation generated by this program, one of the most massive such interventions globally, to estimate the effects of increased physician's supply on local general health outcomes and health care access. Since the increase in the number of physicians in an area is endogenous, we employ an instrumental variable approach to estimate the causal effects. We find an improvement in several health outcomes and other health care access proxies due to the intervention. However, the outcomes could be much better had there been a more equitable distribution of the newly recruited physicians.

3. Risk Preference, Investment Decision, and Household Welfare: Evidence From a Microcredit Experiment in Bangladesh (with Sherry Li & Mohammad Abdul Malek)

We propose a new perspective for low microcredit uptake and heterogeneous treatment effects observed in recent microcredit field experiments -- household risk preference. In a randomized field experiment in Bangladesh, we find that, in response to a microcredit intervention, household risk preference significantly influences microcredit uptake and its outcomes. Risk-seeking households are more likely to take microcredit, rent more land under fixed-rental contracts than share-cropping, adopt more technology, and expand businesses, enhancing total income. Conversely, risk-averse households showed no such gains. Our results underscore risk preference as a crucial factor in microcredit's success, suggesting why some people remain impoverished. 

4. Reinforcing Inequality: Consequences of Elevated Fluoride Exposure and Inequitable Mitigation (with Sheetal Sekhri, Emily Gonzalez, Rajiv Gupta, and Eric Robertson) 

 We establish causal links between elevated fluoride exposure in drinking water, cognition, and health of children. Chronic elevated exposure is deleterious for children, and severely affects poor children's human capital. At the same time, high exposure affects poor individuals' time spent on economic activities, household chores, and water collection. State institutions fail to implement adequate mitigation measures, and there is little evidence of mitigation by households. We observe minimal adaptation overall but none by the poor or the sick households. Environmental exposure leads to a self-reinforcing cycle of poverty: exposure affects cognition and health of children leading to adverse inter-generational consequences, and the poor are not able to offset the risk, depressing economic mobility and perpetuating inequality. (Link to the full paper)

5. Shocks and Brave Farmers: Evidence from a Randomized Agricultural Microfinance Experiment in Bangladesh (with Yasuyuki Sawada & Mohammad Abdul Malek)

Abstract: We examine the role of an agricultural microcredit program in facilitating farmers’ risk coping strategies when experiencing various shocks. We construct a simple two-period model of technology adoption to show consumption credit as an insurance mechanism. The standard balancing tests show that the treatments and shocks are both exogenously given and, thus, our regression results can be interpreted as causal relationships. Shocks considerably increase credit uptake among the treatment groups. We observe a significant impact of microcredit  on outcome indicators, such as,  credit use for farming, land use under share cropping and leasing condition, technology adoption, shifting day laboring to self-farming, and increasing farming income. (Draft available on request)