Evaluating the distributive effects of a micro-credit intervention?

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Maitra, Pushkar; Mitra, Sandip; Mookherjee, Dilip; Visaria, Sujata
• 署名单位: Monash University; Indian Statistical Institute; Indian Statistical Institute Kolkata; Boston University; Hong Kong University of Science & Technology
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF DEVELOPMENT ECONOMICS
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0304-3878
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jdeveco.2022.102896
• 发表日期: 2022
• 关键词: Distributive impacts; Program evaluation; Agricultural finance

摘要

Most analyses of randomized controlled trials of development interventions estimate an average treatment effect on the outcome of interest. However, the aggregate impact on welfare also depends on distributional effects. We propose a simple method to evaluate efficiency-equity trade-offs in the utilitarian tradition of Atkinson (1970). This involves an estimation of the average treatment effect on a monotone concave function of the outcome variable, whose curvature captures the degree of inequality aversion in the welfare function. We argue this is preferable to the current practice of examining distributional impacts through sub-group analysis or quantile treatment effects. We illustrate the approach using data from a credit delivery experiment we implemented in West Bengal, India.