This paper tests experiential learning as a debiasing tool against gambling and lottery behavior in South Africa. The study implemented a simple, interactive dice game that simulates worsening winning odds of rolling sixes as more dice are added to the game.
... 更多显示 The analysis exploits two levels of exogenous variation, first from random assignment into the debiasing game, and second from the number of rolls it takes to obtain the sixes. Treated individuals who needed above-median number of rolls to obtain simultaneous sixes are significantly less likely than the control group to gamble or play the lottery in the following year. The converse is true for individuals who needed below-median number of rolls, suggesting a perverse treatment effect among this group. The analysis also finds suggestive evidence that the debiasing affected the sensitivity to varying winning odds. Changes in entertainment utility or risk preferences cannot explain these findings, rather the results are consistent with changes in risk beliefs.
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One of the most fruitful advances in modern economics has been the introduction of psychological realism into the model of "economic man." The World Development Report 2015 organizes the evidence about how humans actually think and make decisions into a coherent framework useful for designing development policy.
... 更多显示 This paper elaborates on the three principles of human thinking that constitute the report's intellectual framework: Human thinking is dual process -- automatic as well as deliberative (thinking automatically); it is conditioned by social context and the salience of social identities (thinking socially); and it is shaped by mental models that are socially constructed (thinking with mental models). Behavioral insights create scope for policy interventions that produce "miracles" from the perspective of traditional economics.
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Behavioral economics recognizes that mental models -- intuitive sets of ideas about how things work -- can bias an individual's perceptions of himself and the world.
... 更多显示 By representing an ascriptive category of people as unworthy, a mental model can foster unjust social exclusion of, for example, a race, gender, caste, or class. Since the representation is a social construction, shouldn't society be able to control it? But how? This paper considers three interventions that have had some success in developing countries: (1) Group deliberation in Senegal challenged the traditional mental model of female genital cutting and contributed to the abandonment of the practice; (2) political reservations for women and low castes in India improved the way men perceived women, the way parents perceived their daughters, and the way women perceived themselves, but have not generally had positive effects on the low castes; and (3) reductions in the salience of identity closed performance gaps between dominant and stigmatized groups in experiments in India and China. Spoiled collective identities need to be changed or made less prominent in order to overcome social exclusion.
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The development objective of the Dedicated Grant Mechanism (DGM) for Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities (IPLCs) including, a Global Learning and Knowledge Exchange Project for the World is to strengthen the capacity of IPLCs to participate in the forest investment program and other Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) programs at local, national, and global levels.
... 更多显示 Forests comprise the largest terrestrial carbon pool and balance the global carbon budget storing nearly 247gigatons of carbon (45 percent of terrestrial carbon) in their biomass for decades or longer, releasing it to the atmosphere only when burned or cleared for other land uses. Deforestation and forest degradation, however, continue to mobilize greenhouse gases (GHGs) into the atmosphere, disturbing the carbon cycle and contributing to global warming. REDD has emerged as a promising approach that can tackle forest-based emissions and contribute to development outcomes. Greater voice and role for IPLCs will make REDD+ more effective in achieving its goals. The DGM program objective will be achieved by: (i) establishing and strengthening representative IPLC-led governing bodies for DGM decision-making in forest investment program (FIP) pilot countries and at the global level; (ii) providing grants to IPLCs in FIP pilot countries for initiatives consistent with DGM and FIP criteria; (iii) providing training and capacity development in leadership, management, and technical skills to IPLCs at country and global levels; (iv) facilitating knowledge exchange and learning on REDD+ and climate change issues between and among IPLCs at regional and global levels; (v) strengthening networks and alliances of IPLC organizations within and across regions; and (vi) enabling scale up of successful local solutions for forest and landscape management. The program has two parts - the first part comprises the DGM country projects and the second, the global learning and knowledge exchange project which serves as an umbrella to the entire program.
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The paper investigates determinants of civic participation in local budget processes in rural areas in the Kyrgyz Republic by using data from the Life in Kyrgyzstan survey, conducted in 2012.
... 更多显示 The analysis of the data suggests that although civic awareness and interest in local budget processes is relatively high, the participation rate in local budgeting processes is low. The paper also shows that interest, awareness, and participation are positively associated with the age, education, employment, risk-taking attitudes, trust, and social capital of respondents. The paper documents that unawareness and lack of participation are largely related to being female, of non-Kyrgyz ethnic origin, inactive in the labor market, recent internal migrants, and residents of communities with poor infrastructure.
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This newsletter includes the following headings: international comparison program (ICP) in the media; ICP workshops; publications; 46th United Nations Statistical Commission (UNSC) session; and ICP video tutorials.
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IAD is an independent and objective assurance and advisory function designed to add value to the World Bank Group (WBG) by improving the operations of WBGs entities.
... 更多显示 It assists the Bank Group in accomplishing its objectives by bringing a systematic and disciplined approach to evaluate and improve the effectiveness of the organizations governance, risk management, and control processes. IAD also focuses on raising awareness of risks and controls, providing advice to management in developing control solutions, and monitoring the implementation of managements corrective actions to mitigate risks and strengthen controls. IADs work is carried out in accordance with the Institute of Internal Auditors (IIA)s International Professional Practices Framework.
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The Amazon rainforest, the world's largest and most biodiverse, represents a global public good of which 15 percent has already been lost. The worldwide value of preserving the remaining forest is today unknown.
... 更多显示 A "Delphi" exercise was conducted involving more than 200 environmental valuation experts from 36 countries, who were asked to predict the outcome of a survey to elicit willingness to pay for Amazon forest preservation among their own countries' populations. Expert judgments of average willingness-to-pay levels, per household per year, to fund a plan to protect all of the current Amazon rainforest up to 2050, range from $4 to $36 in 12 Asian countries, to near $100 in Canada, Germany, and Norway, with other high-income countries in between. Somewhat lower willingness-to-pay values were found for a less strict plan that allows a 12 percent further rainforest area reduction. The elasticity of experts' willingness-to-pay assessments with respect to own-country per capita income is slightly below but not significantly different from unity when results are pooled across countries and income is adjusted for purchasing power parity.
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The World Bank conducted this study of the potential for Open Transport Data in St. Petersburg as part of the preparations for the Improvement of Urban Transport Systems Project in Russia.
... 更多显示 It is principally intended for use by the St. Petersburg transportation authorities, the Federal Ministry of Transport and the Project Implementation Unit in considering and implementing open data as part of the new systems being developed as part of the Project. There are already good examples of transport information systems in St. Petersburg. Most of this information is not currently available for external use, but in the cases where it has been made available, for instance by the Agency 'Organizer of Transportation' for real-time bus information; this has been welcomed and well-used by citizens and authorities, despite some current limitations. Within the St. Petersburg component of Improvement of Urban Transport Systems Project there are plans for more transport information systems, including parking information, traffic management and passenger information systems. The conclusion of this report is that the social, economic and environmental benefits of the St. Petersburg project would be enhanced by the greater availability and use by travelers and others of the information collected by these planned systems. Making the information available as Open Transport Data and allowing it to be used for development of innovative third-party applications would be a relatively easy and cost-effective way of leveraging the planned investment to ensure that the information reached the largest number of travelers. Doing so will maximize the desired behavioral changes that drive the benefits and improve the overall return on investment.
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Recent media reports of a perceived skills problem in Lao PDR have spurred an intense focus on skills development initiatives. Alarming media coverage of rising wages and complaints among firms of a shortage of skilled workers has raised concerns over whether Lao workers are equipped with the skills sought by firms.
... 更多显示 The Government and other partners have responded by channeling more resources to skills development, for example with investments in vocational training facilities to train more workers. This report argues that the workforce problems which Lao PDR faces do not only stem from problems in the education sector. Looking only to skills development as a solution would not address the fundamental problems constraining economic growth, employment creation, and poverty reduction. Creating an environment conducive for farm and non-farm businesses to make investments and grow remains an essential first step for skills development. As World Bank (2004) states, Training does not create jobs. Skills are a derived demand and that demand depends on policies for growth and employment creation.
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Incorporating qualitative methods into the evaluation of development programs has become increasingly popular in recent years, both for the distinctive insights such approaches can bring in their own right and because of their capacity to complement the strengths -- and where necessary correct some of the weaknesses -- of quantitative approaches.
... 更多显示 Some initial work deploying mixed methods has been undertaken in the assessment of investment climate reforms, but considerable room for expansion exists. This paper summarizes some of the key principles and practices underpinning mixed methods evaluations in development, highlight some notable examples of how such work has been conducted (and the particular contributions it has made), and offers some guidelines for those seeking to increase the sophistication and utility of qualitative methods in the evaluation of investment climate reforms.
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Although there is a general agreement in the literature of the importance of social-emotional skills for labor market success, there is little consensus on the specific skills that should be acquired or how and when to teach them.
... 更多显示 The psychology, economics, policy research, and program implementation literatures all touch on these issues, but they are not sufficiently integrated to provide policy direction. The objective of this paper is to provide a coherent framework and related policies and programs that bridge the psychology, economics, and education literature, specifically that related to skills employers value, non-cognitive skills that predict positive labor market outcomes, and skills targeted by psycho-educational prevention and intervention programs. The paper uses as its base a list of social-emotional skills that employers value, classifies these into eight subgroups (summarized by PRACTICE), then uses the psychology literature -- drawing from the concepts of psycho-social and neuro-biological readiness and age-appropriate contexts -- to map the age and context in which each skill subset is developed. The paper uses examples of successful interventions to illustrate the pedagogical process. The paper concludes that the social-emotional skills employers value can be effectively taught when aligned with the optimal stage for each skill development, middle childhood is the optimal stage for development of PRACTICE skills, and a broad international evidence base on effective program interventions at the right stage can guide policy makers to incorporate social-emotional learning into their school curriculum.
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The term "open data" is generally understood to be data that are made available to the public free of charge, without registration or restrictive licenses, for any purpose whatsoever (including commercial purposes), in electronic, machine-readable formats that ensure data are easy to find, download and use.
... 更多显示 National Statistics Offices (NSOs) have the potential to play a pivotal role in the implementation of open data initiatives. As producers and curators of data, the objective of making high quality data more accessible and usable is consistent with their guiding principles. NSOs indicate, in research conducted in support of this report, that one of the difficulties they encounter is that the technology they use to publish - or electronically distribute - data for public use is not compatible with open formats. They also indicate that common software packages used for open data portals do not accommodate the data formats and metadata they produce. Two key concerns related to data dissemination products are addresses: (1) Can such products designed primarily for NSOs satisfy requirements for an open data initiative?; and (2) Can such products designed primarily for open data satisfy the requirements of NSOs? Furthermore, data reuse, both by data experts and the public at large, is key to creating new opportunities and benefits from government data. The following recommendations are made to improve the overall utility of data publication platforms to NSOs and the open data community: improve technical documentation; ensure public Application Programming Interfaces (APIs) and endpoints are interoperable; presentation of metadata and Uniform Resource Identifiers (URIs) must conform to W3C standards; natural language search and metadata faceting should be standard; structural metadata and hypercube support are core NSO requirements; dashboards and visualisations are necessary for user engagement; and develop data engagement tools for improving data-quality and reuse.
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