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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.

The Impact of Contraceptive Subsidies for Individuals in the United States

Jennifer Barber
Lea Bart
Vanessa Dalton
Daniel Eisenberg
Paula Fomby
Vanessa Lang
Alexa Prettyman
In this randomized evaluation, researchers partnered with Planned Parenthood of Michigan to give vouchers for contraception to evaluate the impact of contraceptive costs on method choice. Those who received the vouchers were more likely to buy contraceptives and buy more expensive methods than those...

The Direct and Indirect Effects of a Dual Apprenticeship Program in Côte d'Ivoire

Patrick Premand
In Sub-Saharan Africa, wage job opportunities are limited, and a vast majority of young people are engaged in low-productive work. Many governments support formal apprenticeship programs to help youth find suitable employment, but there is limited evidence on the direct and indirect effects of these...

Impacts of Conditional Cash Transfer Programs on Voting in Honduras

In this randomized evaluation in Honduras, researchers assessed how the national Programa de Asignación Familiar (Family Allowance Program) CCT program, which provided a combination of transfers to households and transfers to support public goods, influenced voting in local and national elections...

Migration Subsidies and Rural Labor Markets in Bangladesh

Researchers varied the proportion of travel grants offered to landless households in rural villages in Bangladesh to assess the impact of the grants on temporary migration and income during the agricultural lean season—one of the hardest economic times of the year due to drops in food affordability...

Leveraging Teacher Incentives to Improve Student Performance and Reduce Dropout in Uganda

Daniel O. Gilligan
Naureen Karachiwalla
Ibrahim Kasirye
Derek Neal
Researchers evaluated whether an alternative teacher incentive scheme, providing rewards based on the performance of all students, could help reduce dropout and improve student math learning. Introducing the pay-for-percentile incentive scheme reduced overall student dropout rates. However, these...

Evaluating the Impact of Online Education in Russia

Igor Chirikov
René Kizilcec
Natalia Maloshonok
Tatiana Semenova
Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test the impact and cost-effectiveness of fully online and blended STEM classes in Russia on student test scores. Students in online and blended courses achieved similar scores to students in traditional in-person courses at a lower cost.

Community Policing, Citizen Feedback, and Public Trust in Pakistan

Ali Hasanain
It is unclear whether a gender-differentiated intervention may be more effective in reducing some or all types of crime. To better understand this issue, researchers are working with the local police force in two districts in Pakistan to study its effects on trust levels and occurrence of crime.