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Browse news articles about J-PAL and our affiliated professors, and read our press releases and monthly global and research newsletters. For media inquiries, please email us.

Meet Your Future – The Effect of Mentoring Ugandan Vocational Students on Employment and Earnings

Livia Alfonsi
Mary Namubiru
In Uganda, researchers introduced a mentoring program to evaluate the impact of interactions between young, successful vocational training graduates and current vocational training students on their employment status and earnings. Students who received mentoring were more likely to be working three...

Delivering Conditional Cash Transfers Through Checking and Savings Accounts in Chile

Many beneficiaries of social welfare programs around the world receive benefits in cash or by check. Can distributing welfare benefits through electronic transfers directly into bank accounts help some of these low-income individuals enter the formal financial sector? Researchers are partnering with...

The Impact of Nursery Quality, Empowerment, and Nutrition Interventions on Early Childhood Development and Women’s Employment in Egypt

Researchers are conducting a randomized evaluation to test the impact of a package of interventions with the aim of improving the quality of nurseries, enhancing nutrition, and empowering women to address poverty and promote early childhood development in Egypt.

Radio Public Service Announcements and Voter Participation Among Native Americans in the United States

Eline A de Rooij
Can media campaigns increase voter turnout among those underrepresented in the electorate? Researchers randomly assigned areas covered by Native American radio programming to either receive or not receive targeted radio messaging encouraging listeners to vote in the 2008 and 2010 US elections. The...

The Impact of Unconditional Cash Transfers on Consumption and Household Balance Sheets in the United States

David E. Broockman
Patrick Krause
Elizabeth Rhodes
Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation testing the impact of monthly cash transfers of $1,000 to low-income individuals in Texas and Illinois on household expenditures, debts and assets, and financial health. The study found that receiving the cash transfer increased spending by $310 per...

Donating Time for Democracy: Encouraging Citizen Participation in Electoral Work in Mexico

In this study, researchers are partnering with the national electoral authority to test a range of policy interventions designed to ultimately improve poll workers’ attendance during the 2017 state elections.

The Demand for Status Goods in Indonesia

Working with a large bank in Indonesia that markets platinum credit cards to high-income customers, researchers designed a series of randomized evaluations to understand the demand for status goods. Overall, researchers found that a substantial part of the demand for the platinum card is explained...

Testing Alternative Job Evaluation Schemes to Improve Civil Servants’ Work Performance in China

Employers often rely on subjective performance evaluations by supervisors to gauge the performance of workers–particularly in the public sector, where civil servants’ work performance is hard to measure. However, relying on the opinions of local supervisors could cause subordinates to prioritize...