Savings Constraints and Microenterprise Development: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Kenya
dc.contributor.author | Dupas, Pascaline | |
dc.contributor.author | Robinson, Jonathan | |
dc.date | 2010-09-26 | |
dc.date.accessioned | 2010-10-27T15:03:51Z | |
dc.date.available | 2010-10-27T15:03:51Z | |
dc.date.issued | 2010-10-27 | |
dc.identifier.uri | https://hdl.handle.net/2027.42/78202 | |
dc.description.abstract | To what extent does the lack of access to formal financial services impede business growth in low-income countries? While most research on this issue has so far focused on credit market failures, this paper focuses on the role of access to formal saving services. We conducted a field experiment in which a randomly selected sample of elf-employed individuals in rural Kenya got access to an interest-free bank account. As the bank charged substantial withdrawal fees, the de facto interest rate on the account was negative. Despite this, take-up and usage of the account was high among market vendors, especially women. Access to an account had a substantial, positive impact on levels of productive investments among market women, and, within 6 months, led to higher income levels, as proxied by expenditures. These results imply that a substantial fraction of women entrepreneurs have difficulty saving and investing as much as they would like, and have a demand for formal saving devices - even those that o¤er negative interest rates. Our results also imply a relatively high rate of return to capital for the women in our sample, estimated at 5.5% per month at the median. | en_US |
dc.format.extent | 1179577 bytes | |
dc.format.mimetype | application/pdf | |
dc.language.iso | en_US | en_US |
dc.relation.ispartofseries | 111 | en_US |
dc.subject | Financial Services | en_US |
dc.subject | Investment | en_US |
dc.subject | Poverty Alleviation | en_US |
dc.subject | Women | en_US |
dc.subject.other | O12 | en_US |
dc.subject.other | G21 | en_US |
dc.subject.other | L26 | en_US |
dc.title | Savings Constraints and Microenterprise Development: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Kenya | en_US |
dc.type | Working Paper | en_US |
dc.subject.hlbtoplevel | Social Sciences | |
dc.contributor.affiliationum | International Policy Center (IPC); Gerald R. Ford School of Public Policy | en_US |
dc.contributor.affiliationother | UCLA, BREAD and NBER | en_US |
dc.contributor.affiliationother | UC Santa Cruz and BREAD | en_US |
dc.contributor.affiliationumcampus | Ann Arbor | |
dc.description.bitstreamurl | http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/78202/1/ipc-111-dupas-robinson-savings-constraints-microenterprise-development-evidence-kenya.pdf | |
dc.owningcollname | International Policy Center (IPC) - Working Paper Series |
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