Welfare Sensitivity and Positional Preferences in a Developing Country It is well-established in the empirical literature that people care about relative-status or positionality, hence any policy that makes someone better off imposes negative externality on his/her peers. However, the effectiveness of public policy aimed at mitigating positional externality hinges on the measurement of relative concerns, which is individual and context specific requiring empirical data. This study investigates positional concerns among over-exploited natural resource dependent communities with defined gender roles in a developing country, and the specific role of welfare sensitivity in moderating relative concerns. We found that compared to the women, [...]

Gender Norms, Women’s Executive Function, and Anti-Poverty Programs: Experimental Evidence from India Sociocultural norms and executive function are powerful factors in an individual’s agency, decision-making, and development. Gender norms, for example, mediate the relationship between economic development and women’s labor market outcomes. Executive functions make it possible for a person to live, work, and learn. They are important for taking simple to complex actions, from cooking, shopping, nurturing children, planning, and to execution. Low executive functions can frustrate the success of anti-poverty and empowerment programs through participants’ inadequate planning, improper utilization of resources, and the lack of timely actions. In developing [...]