Evaluations

To study the employment limitation of microenterprises, researchers offered microentrepreneurs capital to incentivize them to hire workers. Results showed that a wage subsidy did not lead to lasting increases in employment sales or profits.

To test whether students’ educational investments are affected by peer pressure, researchers offered high school students the opportunity to sign up for free access to an online SAT preparatory course. Some students were told that their decision to sign up would be public, and others were told that...

Researchers offered two days of business training and assistance in identifying a medium-term financial goal to a random sample of women of different castes and religions in India. A random sub-sample of women were invited to attend the training with a friend. Women trained with a friend doubled...

In partnership with a mobile network operator launching a new phone-based savings account, researchers evaluated the role of defaults and financial incentives on savings decisions. Two months after the launch of the phone-based savings account, the company’s employees randomly assigned a default...