Effects Of Cash Transfers Research Articles

The Effect of Cash Transfers and Household Vulnerability on Food Security in Zimbabwe.

The Effect of Cash Transfers and Household Vulnerability on Food Security in Zimbabwe.

Can conditional cash transfers improve the uptake of nutrition interventions and household food security? Evidence from Odisha's Mamata scheme.

There is considerable global evidence on the effectiveness of cash transfers in improving health and nutrition outcomes; however, the evidence from South Asia, particularly India, is limited. In the context of India where more than a third of children are undernourished, and where there is considerable under-utilization of health and nutrition interventions, it is opportune to investigate the impact of cash transfer programs on the use of interventions. We study one conditional cash transfer program, Mamata scheme, implemented in the state of Odisha, in India that targeted pregnant and lactating women. Using survey data on 1161 households from three districts in the state of Odisha, we examine the effect of the scheme on eight outcomes: 1) pregnancy registration; 2) receipt of antenatal services; 3) receipt of iron and folic acid (IFA) tablets; 4) exposure to counseling during pregnancy; 5) exposure to postnatal counseling; 6) exclusive breastfeeding; 7) full immunization; and 8) household food security. We conduct regression analyses and correct for endogeneity using nearest-neighbor matching and inverse-probability weighting models. We find that the receipt of payments from the Mamata scheme is associated with a 5 percentage point (pp) increase in the likelihood of receiving antenatal services, a 10 pp increase in the likelihood of receiving IFA tablets, and a decline of 0.84 on the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale. These results provide the first quantitative estimates of effects associated with the Mamata scheme, which can inform the design of government policies related to conditional cash transfers.

The effect of cash transfers and household vulnerability on food security in Zimbabwe

We study the impact of the Zimbabwe Harmonized Social Cash Transfer (HSCT) on household food security after 12 months of implementation. We investigate determinants of food security as measured by a well-known food security scale – the Household Food Insecurity Access Scale (HFIAS) – and as measured by value of household food consumption composed of own-production, market purchases and gifts received. We find that several dimensions of household vulnerability correlate more strongly with the food security measure than with food consumption. Labor constraints, which is a key vulnerability criterion used by the HSCT to target households, is an important predictor of the food security score but not food consumption, and its effect on food security is even larger during the lean season. Impact analysis shows that the program has had statistically significant impacts on Food Security and Diet Diversity scores but null to low impacts on food consumption. However aggregate food consumption hides dynamic activity taking place within the household where the cash is used to obtain more food from the market and rely less on food received as gifts. The cash in turn gives beneficiaries greater choice in their food basket, which improves diet diversity.

The effects of cash transfers and vouchers on the use and quality of maternity care services: A systematic review.

BackgroundCash transfers and vouchers are forms of ‘demand-side financing’ that have been widely used to promote maternal and newborn health in low- and middle-income countries during the last 15 years.MethodsThis systematic review consolidates evidence from seven published systematic reviews on the effects of different types of cash transfers and vouchers on the use and quality of maternity care services, and updates the systematic searches to June 2015 using the Joanna Briggs Institute approach for systematic reviewing. The review protocol for this update was registered with PROSPERO (CRD42015020637).ResultsData from 51 studies (15 more than previous reviews) and 22 cash transfer and voucher programmes suggest that approaches tied to service use (either via payment conditionalities or vouchers for selected services) can increase use of antenatal care, use of a skilled attendant at birth and in the case of vouchers, postnatal care too. The strongest evidence of positive effect was for conditional cash transfers and uptake of antenatal care, and for vouchers for maternity care services and birth with a skilled birth attendant. However, effects appear to be shaped by a complex set of social and healthcare system barriers and facilitators. Studies have typically focused on an initial programme period, usually two or three years after initiation, and many lack a counterfactual comparison with supply-side investment. There are few studies to indicate that programmes have led to improvements in quality of maternity care or maternal and newborn health outcomes.ConclusionFuture research should use multiple intervention arms to compare cost-effectiveness with similar investment in public services, and should look beyond short- to medium-term service utilisation by examining programme costs, longer-term effects on service utilisation and health outcomes, and the equity of those effects.

Cash‐based approaches in humanitarian emergencies: a systematic review

Cash‐based approaches in humanitarian emergencies: a systematic review

PROTOCOL: The effect of cash transfers on social solidarity: A systematic review

PROTOCOL: The effect of cash transfers on social solidarity: A systematic review

The Effect of Cash Transfers on Fertility: Evidence from Argentina

In 2009 Argentina introduced a large poverty-alleviation program (AUH) that provides monthly cash transfers per child to households without workers in the formal sector. In this paper we study the potential unintended effect of this program on fertility. We apply a difference-in-difference strategy comparing the probability of having a new child among eligible and ineligible mothers both before and after the program inception. The intention to treat estimations suggest a significant positive impact on fertility in households with at least one child (around 2 percentage points), but no significant effect on childless households. Given the short time window since the implementation of the AUH, we are unable to identify whether this positive effect reflects changes in the timing of births or in the equilibrium number of children.

‘Being Able to Breathe Again’: The Effects of Cash Transfer Programmes on Psychosocial Wellbeing

The multidimensional nature of poverty and vulnerability and the role of psychosocial dimensions in achieving wellbeing are increasingly being recognised, yet development programme assessments still tend to focus on material outcomes. We situate this article within a wellbeing framework and after reviewing evidence on the psychosocial effects of cash transfer programmes, we explore findings from a qualitative and participatory study on beneficiary experiences of unconditional cash transfers in the Middle East and Sub-Saharan Africa. Narratives reveal how cash transfers can improve psychosocial wellbeing at individual level and in relation to others suggesting that psychosocial dimensions need to be considered when planning, implementing and evaluating cash transfer programmes.

Effects of Cash Transfers on Community Interactions: Emerging Evidence

This article examines evidence of the effects of national cash transfer programmes on community interactions and discusses the transformative potential of such programmes. The findings indicate positive effects of social transfers on strengthening ‘bonding’ social capital and on breaking patterns of exclusion, but also point to negative effects, particularly in fuelling intra-community tensions and generating feelings of unfairness resulting – for the most part – from targeting-related issues. Evidence remains limited on the formation of ‘bridging’ and ‘linking’ social capital and on the development of mobilisation processes to drive broader processes of social transformation and changes in the status quo.

The Anti-Incumbent Effects of Conditional Cash Transfer Programs

AbstractScholars concur that conditional cash transfer (CCT) programs have a strong proincumbent effect among beneficiaries. Although no study has properly focused on the overall effect of cash transfers on incumbents' national vote shares, most scholars have deduced that this effect is positive; i.e., that cash transfers lead to the expansion of incumbents' electoral bases. This article analyzes survey data from nearly all Latin American countries and confirms that beneficiaries of CCT programs are more likely to support incumbents. However, it also shows that CCT programs may induce many voters who were previously incumbent supporters to vote for the opposition. As a consequence, the overall impact of cash transfers on incumbents' vote shares is indeterminate; it depends on the balance between both patterns of behavioral changes among voters. This study is the first to report evidence that cash transfer programs may have significant anti-incumbent effects.

Effect on child cognitive function of increasing household expenditure in Indonesia: application of a marginal structural model and simulation of a cash transfer programme.

Parental investments in children are an important determinant of human capability formation. We investigated the causal effect of household expenditure on Indonesian children's cognitive function between 2000 and 2007. We also investigated the effect of change in mean cognitive function from a simulation of a hypothetical cash transfer intervention. A longitudinal analysis using data from the Indonesian Family Life Survey (IFLS) was conducted including 6136 children aged 7 to 14 years in 2000 and still alive in 2007. We used the inverse probability of treatment weighting of a marginal structural model to estimate the causal effect of household expenditure on children's cognitive function. Cumulative household expenditure was positively associated with cognitive function z-score. From the marginal structural model, a 74534 rupiah/month (about US$9) increase in household expenditure resulted in a 0.03 increase in cognitive function z-score [β=0.32, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.30-0.35] Based on our simulations, among children in the poorest households in 2000 an additional ≈ US$6-10 of cash transfer resulted in a 0.01 unit increase in cognitive function z-score, equivalent to about 6% increase from the mean z-score prior to cash transfer. In contrast, children in the poorest household in 2007 did not benefit from an additional ≈ US$10 cash transfer. We found no overall effect of cash transfers at the total population level. Greater household expenditure had a small causal effect on children's cognitive function. Although cash transfer interventions had a positive effect for poor children, this effect was quite small. Multi-faceted interventions that combine nutrition, cash transfer, improved living conditions and women's education are required to benefit children's cognitive development in Indonesia.

Cash Transfers to the Poor and the Labor Market: An Equilibrium Analysis

This paper studies the effects of cash transfers to the poor on the labor market. This is investigated in a matching model with endogenous labor market participation and job destruction. Depending on their productivity, workers might want to stay in the job, become unemployed, or leave the labor market; in addition, workers out of the labor force might decide to search for a job. Cash transfers are introduced to all agents with income below a given level. Two qualitative results are found: (i) The size of cash transfers has a negative effect on the employment rate, but an ambiguous effect on the unemployment rate; and (ii) the coverage of this welfare program has a positive effect on the employment rate, and an ambiguous effect on the unemployment rate. The numerical simulations also show that: (i) if the government target is to reduce inequality and poverty, the more efficient policy is to increase the level of benefits instead of increasing the eligibility of the program; (ii) compared with a welfare program that condition eligibility to labor market participation, the “unconditional” cash transfer program has a stronger impact on inequality and poverty, but with a reduction in labor market participation and output.

Cash Transfers and Child Labor

Cash transfer programs are widely used in settings where child labor is prevalent. Although many of these programs are explicitly implemented to improve children’s welfare, in theory their impact on child labor is undetermined. This paper systematically reviews the empirical evidence on the impact of cash transfers, conditional and unconditional, on child labor. The authors find no evidence that cash transfer interventions increase child labor in practice. On the contrary, there is broad evidence that conditional and unconditional cash transfers lower both children’s participation in child labor and their hours worked and that these transfers cushion the effect of economic shocks that may lead households to use child labor as a coping strategy. Boys experience particularly strong decreases in economic activities, whereas girls experience such decreases in household chores. The authors findings underline the usefulness of cash transfers as a relatively safe policy instrument to improve child welfare but also point to knowledge gaps, for instance regarding the interplay between cash transfers and other interventions, that should be addressed in future evaluations to provide detailed policy advice. The remainder of this review is organized as follows. Section 1 provides the necessary background. It heuristically describes why the effects of cash transfers on child labor are theoretically undetermined, and it introduces the procedure that we used to identify the relevant studies for this review. Section 2 discusses the impact of two subsets of unconditional cash transfers: programs designed to support poor households’ investments in children’s human capital and old age pension schemes. Section 3 discusses the average impact of conditional cash transfer schemes on the intensive and extensive margin of child labor, the impact of conditional cash transfers on child labor compared to their impact on school participation, heterogeneity by poverty, age, and gender, spillover effects, long-run effects, determinants of program effects, protection from shocks, and variations on the basic conditional cash transfer scheme. Section 4 discusses and concludes.

Cash transfer programmes, income inequality and regional disparities. The case of the Uruguayan Asignaciones Familiares

This article aims at contributing to the debate on the effectiveness of cash transfers in terms of income inequality variations at the national and regional level, in middle-income countries like Uruguay. We microsimulate how targeting criteria affect impacts on school attendance, income inequality and poverty of the recently incepted cash transfer programme Asignaciones Familiares. Our results show that inequality tends to persist although programme effects on child education, indigence and poverty are positive. Targeting mechanisms strongly condition both the geographical distribution of beneficiaries and school attendance outcomes but do not affect regional disparities and programme effects on inequality.

Does Money Matter? The Effects of Cash Transfers on Child Development in Rural Ecuador

A large body of research indicates that child development is sensitive to early-life environments, so that poor children are at higher risk for poor cognitive and behavioral outcomes. These developmental outcomes are important determinants of success in adulthood. Yet, remarkably little is known about whether poverty-alleviation programs improve children's developmental outcomes. We examine how a government-run cash transfer program for poor mothers in rural Ecuador influenced the development of young children. Random assignment at the parish level is used to identify program effects. Our data include a set of measures of cognitive ability that are not typically included in experimental or quasi-experimental studies of the impact of cash transfers on child well-being, as well as a set of physical health measures that may be related to developmental outcomes. The cash transfer program had positive, although modest, effects on the physical, cognitive, and socioemotional development of the poorest children in our sample.

Strengthening the social welfare sector: Expanding the reach and effectiveness of cash transfers

Strengthening the social welfare sector: Expanding the reach and effectiveness of cash transfers

Examining ways in which contact opportunities associated with transfers might help identify vulnerable households and link them with social welfare services: A systematic review of the literature

This review sets out to examine the published literature, exploring ways in which contact opportunities associated with cash transfers might help to identify vulnerable households and link them with social welfare services. Social welfare is a very broad construct, ranging from formalized social work provision to an array of service-type encounters, which could fall under the wide umbrella of social welfare, legal provision, family support services, child protective services and alternative care. A systematic review of published papers on cash transfer and social welfare generated 146 studies that were hand-sorted according to a series of inclusion criteria. These required availability of data, design competence and presence of a control group, from low/middle-income countries, cash transfers rather than other transfer types, accessible in the published literature in English reporting on developmental transfers as opposed to emergency transfers. Geographic and provision criteria were reached by 37 studies and only 12 of these included empirical data. Nine were evaluation studies, two used secondary analysis of existing data to explore childbearing and one presented a study synthesis. The majority emanated from South America (only one from South Africa). Two of the 12 were non-conditional pensions (Brazil and South Africa). The remainder were conditional transfers. The review showed that there is a lack of clearly identified, well-controlled, systematic studies from which to glean a sound evidence base on social welfare and cash transfer to guide policy. Studies reporting on nutritional status/child growth found positive effects of cash transfers (n = 6). Children benefiting from the programmes were healthier than those who were not enrolled in the programmes. Studies recorded positive effects of cash transfers on migration outcomes, psychological outcomes, preventative health-care participation, some health outcomes and school-related outcomes such as improved attendance, enhanced enrolment, reduced dropout and earlier enrolment. Cash transfers improved household consumption and expenditures (more spent on children's clothing, education and food – better quality food) to benefit children of the household. Programmes decreased or had no impact on fertility in Mexico, Nicaragua and Turkey. There were some increases in Honduras, which may or may not be related to the programme. No evaluations of cash transfer schemes reported on direct social welfare provision, legal and protective service access and provision. Grandparent residence and reductions in child labour were associated with cash transfers. In countries where there is a lack of traditional provision in terms of social work, there is a large gap in the provision of social support in general, including cash transfer schemes. The growing literature has shown the need for integration of social welfare into existing provision – be it the location of social welfare in general practice or the combining of government support through non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and community-based projects. The clear message is that stand-alone provision may, in itself, be a barrier to access. Studies should move beyond access to services to explore the implications of service provision for health and welfare gains. This review of studies shows multiple opportunities within existing cash transfer provision for social welfare contacts.

Cents and Sociability: Household Income and Social Capital in Rural Tanzania

In this article we show that associational relationships and social norms of villages in rural Tanzania are both capital and social. After outlining the various concepts of social capital we tell how and why we created data on social capital using a large-scale household survey in rural Tanzania that was designed to query households about their social connections and attitudes. By using the Social Capital and Poverty Survey (SCPS) and data from a different survey, which also had information on incomes, we show that a village’s social capital has an effect on the incomes of the households in that village, an effect that is empirically large, definitely social, and plausibly causal. Finally, we use the two data sets to examine a number of proximate channels through which social capital appears to operate.