Exploring Recipient Preferences and Allocation Mechanisms in the Distribution of Development Aid

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 749-766
Author(s):  
Jeremy Shapiro
Keyword(s):  
Public Goods ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Cash Transfers ◽  
Low Resource ◽  
Perceived Need ◽  
Incentive Compatible ◽  
Private Contributions ◽  
Resource Levels

Abstract This study uses incentive-compatible techniques to obtain valuations of 14 common poverty reduction interventions from (probable) aid recipients. Recipients’ valuations for these interventions are highly heterogeneous both across interventions and across recipients of the same intervention. Valuation for interventions does not correlate with overall poverty or with perceived need for specific interventions, suggesting that targeting individuals with high valuations based on recipient characteristics is difficult. Through simulations, this study assesses how various allocation mechanisms—cash transfers and voting—compare in generating recipient surplus in the allocation of aid. When markets function and constraints on joint private contributions to public goods do not bind, cash transfers generate considerably more recipient surplus than voting. Even when cash transfers cannot enable public goods and some services, they may still outperform voting at very low resource levels. However, as resource levels increase, voting dominates cash transfers from a surplus-maximization perspective.

scholarly journals Cash transfers may increase the no-show rate for surgical patients in low-resource settings: A randomized trial

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark G Shrime ◽  
Elizabeth A Harter ◽  
Becky Handforth ◽  
Christine L Phillips ◽  
Hendrika W C Bos ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Conditional Cash Transfer ◽  
Cash Transfers ◽  
Cash Transfer ◽  
Surgical Patients ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Low Resource Settings ◽  
Low Resource ◽  
Resource Setting ◽  
Transfer Group ◽  
Unconditional Cash Transfer

Background: Over two-thirds of the world's population cannot access surgery when needed. Interventions to address this gap have primarily focused on surgical training and ministry-level surgical planning. However, patients more commonly cite cost--rather than governance or surgeon availability--as their primary access barrier. We undertook a randomized, controlled trial (RCT) to evaluate the effect on compliance with scheduled surgical appointments of addressing this barrier through a cash transfer. Methods: 453 patients who were deemed surgical candidates by a nursing screening team in Guinea, West Africa, were randomized into three study arms: control, conditional cash transfer, and labeled unconditional cash transfer. Arrival to a scheduled surgical appointment was the primary outcome. The study was performed in conjunction with Mercy Ships. Results: The overall no-show rate was five-fold lower in Guinea than previously published estimates, leading to an underpowered study. In a post-hoc analysis, which included non-randomized patients, patients in the control group and the conditional cash transfer group demonstrated no effect from the cash transfer. Patients in the unconditional cash transfer group were significantly less likely to arrive for their scheduled appointment. Subgroup analysis suggested that actual receipt of the unconditional cash transfer, instead of a lapse in the transfer mechanism, was associated with failure to show. Conclusion: We find that cash transfers are feasible for surgical patients in a low-resource setting, but that unconditional transfers may have negative effects on compliance. Although demand-side barriers are large for surgical patients in low-resource settings, interventions to address them must be designed with care.

Do Financial Flows Make a Difference in Fragile States?

2021 ◽  
pp. 449-492
Author(s):  
Ralph Chami ◽  
Ekkehard Ernst ◽  
Connel Fullenkamp ◽  
Anne Oeking
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Direct Investment ◽  
Direct Investment ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Positive Contribution ◽  
Fragile States ◽  
Decent Work ◽  
Financial Flows ◽  
Weak Institutions ◽  
Official Development Aid

A rising number of people is living in fragile countries whose weak institutions fail to deliver on decent work and poverty reduction. The chapter discusses to what extent external financial flows, such as remittances, foreign direct investment or official development aid, can substitute for weak institutions. Fragility matters: fragile countries receive different amounts of financial flows than their non-fragile peers, and these flows affect them differently. Fragility lowers the effect of financial flows on growth, living standards and inequality. Foreign direct investment (FDI) has a moderate impact on poverty alleviation, albeit concentrated on employment gains in mining and natural resources. Remittances provide some weak relief for the poor, with less pernicious effects on growth and labour supply than in non-fragile countries. ODA does not improve social outcomes but rather exacerbates fragility. Policymakers should focus on improving upon the positive contribution of FDI and remittances on jobs and growth, avoiding the remittances trap.

AID FOR TRADE FLOWS AND POVERTY REDUCTION

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-44
Author(s):  
SÈNA KIMM GNANGNON
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Poverty Reduction ◽  
Development Aid ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Policy Debate ◽  
Product Concentration ◽  
Aid For Trade ◽  
Official Development Aid ◽  
The Empirical Analysis ◽  
Export Product

The effectiveness of Aid for Trade (AfT) interventions, including with respect to recipient countries’ trade performance, has now been well explored in the literature. However, in spite of the voluminous literature on the poverty effect of the total official development aid, the effect of AfT flows on poverty has received little attention on the empirical front. This paper aims to contribute to the policy debate on this matter by investigating the effect of AfT flows on poverty in recipient countries. In particular, the analysis explores whether this effect translates through countries’ level of export product concentration, as the latter can influence income inequality, and hence the transformation of economic growth into poverty reduction in recipient countries. The empirical analysis, based on 100[Formula: see text]AfT recipient countries, has shown that AfT interventions are associated with poverty reduction in countries that diversify their export products, including toward manufacturing products. Additionally, AfT flows dampen the positive poverty effect of income inequality, and lead to greater poverty reduction in countries with a great extent of fiscal redistribution. Finally, the analysis has shown that AfT interventions mitigate the positive poverty effect of import product concentration. These results have important policy implications.

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