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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.

School Fee Loans to Increase Students Educational Outcomes in Uganda

Researchers are evaluating the impact of a digital school fee loan, with and without a direct repayment incentive, on repayment rates, households’ well-being, and students’ educational outcomes.

The Impact of Emergency Cash Assistance in a Pandemic

Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation in Colombia to assess the effects of emergency cash assistance on the well-being of households. Recipients of the UCT experienced improved financial health, food access, and psychological well-being. Colombia’s newly implemented mobile money system...

Increasing Take-Up of the Earned Income Tax Credit

Across six randomized evaluations, researchers studied the impact of low-cost, low-touch informational interventions, or “nudges,” on take-up of the federal and state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) in California. None of the interventions had an impact on EITC take-up, suggesting that information...

Empowering women through mobile money in Tanzania

Empowering women not only has the potential to improve their lives, but also their children's health and education. In partnership with Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) and BRAC, researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test whether encouraging women to make weekly loan repayments...

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...

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.

The Impact of Role Models on Parental Aspirations and Investments in Children's Education in Ethiopia

Alemayehu Seyoum Taffesse
Researchers conducted a randomized evaluation to test whether exposing people to a documentary featuring potential role models impacted parents’ educational aspirations for their children or their actual investments in education, and if these impacts varied by gender. Exposing families to the...

Improving Tax Compliance through Behavioral Messages in Latvia

Nina Mazar
Iman Sen
In partnership with the Latvian tax authority, researchers tested several types of emails to investigate the effect of behaviorally-informed messages on tax compliance. Messages that aimed to deter bad behavior by highlighting taxpayers’ moral obligations towards action increased on-time tax...