Opening Up Pandora’s Box: The Effect of Gender Targeting and Conditionality on Household Spending Behavior in Mexico’s Progresa Program

Handa, Sudhanshu; Peterman, Amber; Davis, Benjamin; Stampini, Marco

doi:10.1016/j.worlddev.2008.10.005

Cited by 79 publications

(72 citation statements)

References 17 publications

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“…x There is some heterogeneity across programmes, where findings from PROGRESA (Handa et al, 2009) and Oportunidades (Todd et al, 2010) were of smaller magnitude than those from Colombia's Familias en Acción (Attanasio and Mesnard, 2005). However, the interesting finding is that within these same programmes, food and total consumption were found to increase by equivalent proportions.…”

Section: Impacts On Consumption Investment and Savingsmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…There was no evidence that CCTs crowded out pre-existing forms of risk sharing such as remittances in Mexico (Skoufias, 2007), Honduras and Nicaragua (Nielsen and Olinto, 2007;Hernandez et al, 2009). 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55 56 57 58 59 A number of papers argue for the need to broaden the scope of the evaluations to capture spillovers and general equilibrium effects (Fafchamps and Lund, 2003;Skoufias and di Maro, 2008;Angelucci and de Giorgi, 2009;Handa et al, 2001Handa et al, , 2009. CCTs were associated with a 4…”

Section: Risk Sharing and Community Level Impactsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…percentage point lower rate of increase in village level poverty incidence, depth and severity in Mexico (Handa et al, 2009), the size of the impact increasing over time (Skoufias and di Maro, 2008). CCTs were also associated with an increase in food consumption among ineligible households, partly because of greater availability of resources within the village but also because resources were shifted away from recipient households (Angelucci and de Giorgi, 2009).…”

Section: Risk Sharing and Community Level Impactsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…There was possible evidence of positive spillover effects on non-beneficiary secondary school attendance and attainment (Gignoux, 2009), as well as health care behaviour and fewer sick days among non-beneficiaries, an effect which also increased over time (Handa et al, 2001). There was no evidence of inflationary impacts of transfers in Mexico, possibly because beneficiaries spent their money outside their own communities (for instance in the municipal capital) especially when they had to travel outside their communities to receive their transfers (Handa et al, 2009). …”

Section: Risk Sharing and Community Level Impactsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 3 more Smart Citations

Economic impacts of conditional cash transfer programmes: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Kabeer

Waddington

2015

Journal of Development Effectiveness

112

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Section: Impacts On Consumption Investment and Savingsmentioning

confidence: 98%

Section: Risk Sharing and Community Level Impactsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Risk Sharing and Community Level Impactsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Risk Sharing and Community Level Impactsmentioning

confidence: 99%

See 2 more Smart Citations

Economic impacts of conditional cash transfer programmes: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Kabeer

Waddington

2015

Journal of Development Effectiveness

112

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“…A number of papers have discussed the pros and cons of conditional cash transfers (CCTs) as opposed to unconditional cash transfers (UCTs), from both a public and private perspective (see, for example Baird et al 2013, de Brauw and Hoddinott, 2011and Handa et al 2009). From the public perspective, imposing conditions may help the government to overcome information asymmetries: government may be aware of the benefits associated with preventive health care or education but individuals may be unconvinced or unaware of these benefits, they may have a shorter time horizon because of lack of risk management instruments, or there may be cultural barriers to investing in certain activities such as girls' education.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Does 'Soft Conditionality' Increase the Impact of Cash Transfers on Desired Outcomes? Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Lesotho

et al. 2016

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Cash transfers programs have been shown to have positive effects on a variety of outcomes. While much of the literature focuses on the role of conditionality in achieving desired impact, this paper focuses on the role of 'soft conditionality' implemented through both 'labeling' and 'messaging' in evaluating the impact of the Child Grants Program in Lesotho, an unconditional cash transfer targeting poor households with orphans and vulnerable children. Beneficiary households received a clear message that the transfer should be spent on the interest and needs of children. Our findings are based on a randomized experiment and suggest that 'soft conditionality' does play a strong role in increasing expenditure for children, especially on education, clothing and footwear. Results indicate in fact that transfer income is spent differently from general income as it exerts both an income and a substitution effect. This behavioral change is confirmed by comparing the ex-ante expected behaviors with the ex-post actual response to the program. We find that for expenditure categories linked to the wellbeing of children the ex-post response was much higher than the ex-ante expected behavior.Keywords : cash transfers; consumption; food security; impact evaluation; randomized experiment; soft conditionality T h i s W o r k i n g P a p e r i s p u b l i s h e d u n d e r t h e a u s p i c e s o f t h e D e p a r t m e n t o f E c o n o m i c s o f t h e C a ' F o s c a r i U n i v e r s i t y o f V e n i c e . O p i n i o n s e x p r e s s e d h e r e i n a r e t h o s e o f t h e a u t h o r s a n d n o t t h o s e o f t h e D e p a r t m e n t . T h e W o r k i n g P a p e r s e r i e s i s d e s i g n e d t o d i v u l g e p r e l i m i n a r y o r i n c o m p l e t e w o r k , c i r c u l a t e d t o f a v o u r d i s c u s s i o n a n d c o m m e n t s . C i t a t i o n o f t h i s p a p e r s h o u l d c o n s i d e r i t s p r o v i s i o n a l c h a r a c t e r .1 Does "soft conditionality" increase the impact of cash transfers on desired outcomes? Evidence from a randomized control trial in LesothoNoemi Pace*, Silvio Daidone, Benjamin Davis, Luca Pellerano AbstractCash transfers programs have been shown to have positive effects on a variety of outcomes. While much of the literature focuses on the role of conditionality in achieving desired impact, this paper focuses on the role of 'soft conditionality' implemented through both 'labeling' and 'messaging' in evaluating the impact of the Child Grants Program in Lesotho, an unconditional cash transfer targeting poor households with orphans and vulnerable children. Beneficiary households received a clear message that the transfer should be spent on the interest and needs of children. Our findings are based on a randomized experiment and suggest that 'soft conditionality' does play a strong role in increasing expenditure for children, especially on education, clothing and footwear. Results indicate in fact that transfer income is spent differently from general income...

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Payments for ecosystem services and conditional cash transfers in a policy mix: Microlevel interactions in Selva Lacandona, Mexico

Izquierdo‐Tort

2019

Env Pol Gov

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Payments for ecosystem services (PES) programs have been increasingly studied with a policy mix perspective. So far, the focus has been on PES' interplay with other conservation instruments and resulting environmental outcomes at meso-and macrolevels. Though PES often operate among "poor" forest-dwelling communities in the Global South, our knowledge on PES' interactions with poverty alleviation policies is scarce, especially at the microlevel. This article examines PES' interactions-in terms of joint coverage, management, and spending of revenues, and socioeconomic effects of participation-with a conditional cash transfer (CCT) program in a case study of six communities in Selva Lacandona, Chiapas, Mexico. The article builds a dual framework combining policy mix analysis with an actor-oriented approach focused on participants' microagency, and is based on in-depth, qualitative research. Results reveal widespread joint PES and CCT coverage, and patterns of specialization between different household members regarding the management and spending of program revenues. Results also show positive, multilevel policy interactions as participants combine resources to pursue individual and collective socioeconomic strategies. The article highlights the creative ways in which local stakeholders integrate individual policies within their broader livelihoods, and how coordination failures among policy-implementing institutions and deficient public services limit participants' ability to achieve sustained livelihood improvements. The article also highlights how a focus on microlevel policy interactions complements meso-and macrolevel analyses for a better understanding of PES' role in a policy mix and concludes by providing some recommendations for building implementation synergies and improving program design. K E Y W O R D S Chiapas, conditional cash transfers (CCT), Lacandon rainforest, Mexico, payments for ecosystem services (PES), policy interactions, policymix, poverty alleviation

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Opening Up Pandora’s Box: The Effect of Gender Targeting and Conditionality on Household Spending Behavior in Mexico’s Progresa Program

Cited by 79 publications

References 17 publications

Economic impacts of conditional cash transfer programmes: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Economic impacts of conditional cash transfer programmes: a systematic review and meta-analysis

Does 'Soft Conditionality' Increase the Impact of Cash Transfers on Desired Outcomes? Evidence from a Randomized Control Trial in Lesotho

Payments for ecosystem services and conditional cash transfers in a policy mix: Microlevel interactions in Selva Lacandona, Mexico

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