Higher Seminar in Economics | Pro-Poor Transfers and Economic Preferences of the Rich and Poor with Imran Rasul, UCL
Welcome to the Higher Seminar in Economics organised by the Department of Economics, SSE. The seminar speaker is Imran Rasul, University College London.
Imran Rasul is Professor of Economics at University College London, co-director of the Centre for the Microeconomic Analysis of Public Policy at the Institute for Fiscal Studies, and Research Programme Director in the Firms portfolio, at the International Growth Centre. Professor Rasul currently serves as the Managing Editor of the Journal of the European Economic Association (JEEA).
More about the speaker
Imran will be presenting a paper titled "Pro-Poor Transfers and Economic Preferences of the Rich and Poor"
Abstract
We study the impact of pro-poor transfers on the economic preferences of households. We do so in the context of small village economies in Punjab Pakistan. Using a randomized control tracking 18,000 households over four years, we document the impacts on two prominent and high-valued forms of pro-poor transfer: asset transfers, and equivalent valued unconditional cash transfers. We study the impact these policies have on the following interlinked dimensions of economic preferences: the demand for redistribution, perceptions of inequality, pro-market beliefs and social capital. We examine this using a partial population experiment, where in treatment and control villages we track both ultra-poor beneficiaries, non-poor households, as well as a randomly selected group of non-treated ultra-poor households in treated villages (who are overtaken in economic standing by ultra-poor beneficiaries in their treated village).
This is an online seminar which will take place via Zoom. The link to the seminar will be distrubted by invitation only. Please contact kristen.pendleton@hhs.se if you would like to attend the seminar.