Econ 277B  Economic Development II: Development Microeconomics

Tridip Ray, Indian Statistical Institute, New Delhi

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Syllabus

General Readings

  1. Ray, Debraj (1998), Development Economics, Princeton University Press.
     

  2. Bardhan, Pranab and Christopher Udry (1999), Development Microeconomics, Oxford University Press.
     

  3. Banerjee, Abhijit, Roland Benabou and Dilip Mookherjee (2006), eds. Understanding Poverty, Oxford University Press.
     

  4. Banerjee, Abhijit and Esther Duflo (2011), Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty, Public Affairs.

Introduction

  1. Banerjee, Abhijit and Esther Duflo (2007), "The Economic Lives of the Poor", Journal of Economic Perspectives, 21, 141-167.
     

  2. Banerjee, Abhijit and Esther Duflo (2008), "What is Middle Class About the Middle Classes Around the World?" Journal of Economic Perspectives, 22, 3-28.
     

  3. Banerjee, Abhijit, "Big Answers for Big Questions: The Presumption of Growth Policy", Brookings Global Economy and Development Conference, June 2008.

Agricultural Organization and Productivity in Developing Countries

Agrarian Organization

  1. * Eswaran, Mukesh and Ashok Kotwal (1986), "Access to Capital and Agrarian Production Organization", Economic Journal, 96, 482-498.
     
  2. Eswaran, Mukesh and Ashok Kotwal (1985), "A Theory of Two-Tier Labour Markets in Agrarian Economies", American Economic Review, 75, 162-177.

Land Rental Contracts

  1. Ray, Debraj (1998), Development Economics, Princeton University Press; Chapter 12.
     
  2. * Stiglitz, Joseph E. (1974), "Incentives and Risk Sharing in Sharecropping", Review of Economic Studies, 41, 219-255.
     
  3. * Laffont, Jean-Jacques and Mohamed Salah Matoussi (1995), "Moral Hazard, Financial Constraints and Sharecropping in El Oulja", Review of Economic Studies, 62, 381-399.
     
  4. Singh, Nirvikar (2000), "Theories of Sharecropping", in Readings in Development Microeconomics: Micro-Theory, volume 1, ed. Pranab Bardhan and Christopher Udry, Cambridge: MIT Press.
     
  5. * Shaban, Radwan (1987), "Testing between Competing Models of Sharecropping", Journal of Political Economy, 95, 893-920.
     
  6. * Braido, Luis H. B. (2008), "Evidence on the Incentive Properties of Share Contracts", Journal of Law and Economics, 51, 327-349.
     
  7. * Ackerberg, Daniel A. and Maristella Botticini (2002): "Endogenous Matching and Empirical Determinants of Contractual Form", Journal of Political Economy, 110, 564-591.

Land Reform

  1. * Banerjee, Abhijit V., Paul J. Gertler and Maitreesh Ghatak (2002), "Empowerment and Efficiency: Tenancy Reform in West Bengal", Journal of Political Economy, 110, 239-280.
     
  2. * Besley, Timothy and Robin Burgess (2000), "Land Reform, Poverty Reduction, and Growth: Evidence from India", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 115, 389-430.

Land Acquisition

  1. Ghatak, Maitreesh and Dilip Mookherjee (2014), "Land Acquisition for Industrialization and Compensation for Displaced Farmers", Journal of Development Economics, 110, 303-312.
     

  2. Ghatak, Maitreesh and Parikshit Ghosh (2011), "The Land Acquisition Bill: A Critique and a Proposal", Economic and Political Weekly, October 8, 2011, Vol. XLVI, No. 41, pages 65-72.

Interlinkage of Transactions

  1. Braverman, Avishay and Joseph E. Stiglitz (1982), "Sharecropping and the Interlinking of Agrarian Markets", American Economic Review, 72, 695-715.
     

  2. Bardhan, Pranab and Christopher Udry (1999), "Interlinkage of Transactions and Rural Development", Chapter 9, Development Microeconomics, Oxford University Press.

Credit Markets in Developing Countries: Theory and Evidence

  1. Ray, Debraj (1998), Development Economics, Princeton University Press; Chapter 14.
     

  2. Bardhan, Pranab and Christopher Udry (1999), Development Microeconomics, Oxford University Press; Chapter 7.
     

  3. * Ghosh, Parikshit, Dilip Mookherjee and Debraj Ray (2001), "Credit Rationing in Developing Countries: An Overview of the Theory", Chapter 11, Readings in the Theory of Economic Development, ed. Mookherjee, Dilip and Debraj Ray, London: Blackwell.
     

  4. Banerjee, Abhijit, Esther Duflo and Kaivan Munshi (2003): "The (Mis)allocation of Capital", Journal of the European Economic Association, 1, Papers and Proceedings, 484-494.
     

  5. Banerjee, Abhijit and Esther Duflo (2014), "Do Firms Want to Borrow More? Testing Credit Constraints Using a Directed Lending Program", Review of Economic Studies, 81.
     

  6. Karlan, Dean and Jonathan Zinman (2009), "Observing Unobservables: Identifying Information Asymmetries with a Consumer Credit Field Experiment", Econometrica, 77, 1993-2008.
     

  7. Pascaline Dupas and Jonathan Robinson (2013): "Savings Constraints and Microenterprise Development: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Kenya," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 5(1): 163-192.
     

  8. Jack, William, Michael Kremer, Joost de Laat, and Tavneet Suri (2019): "Borrowing Requirements, Credit Access, and Adverse Selection: Evidence from Kenya." NBER Working Paper.

Rural Financial Intermediaries

  1. * Conning, Jonathan and Christopher Udry (2007), "Rural Financial Markets in Developing Countries", in Handbook of Agricultural Economics, vol. 3, edited by R. E. Evenson, P. Pingali and T. P. Schultz, Elsevier, 2857-2908; section 4.
     

  2. Hoff, Karla and Joseph E. Stiglitz (1997), "Moneylenders and Bankers: Price-increasing Subsidies in a Monopolistically Competitive Market", Journal of Development Economics, 52, 429-462.
     

  3. Kranton, Rachel E. and Anand V. Swamy (1999), "The Hazards of Piecemeal Reform: British Civil Courts and the Credit Market in Colonial India", Journal of Development Economics, 58, 1-24.
     

  4. * Gine, Xavier (2011), "Access to Capital in Rural Thailand: An Estimated Model of Formal vs. Informal Credit", Journal of Development Economics, 96, 16-29.

Interaction of Formal and Informal Credit Markets

  1. * Tressel, Thierry (2003), "Dual Financial Systems and Inequalities in Economic Development", Journal of Economic Growth, 8, 223-257.
     

  2. * Madestam, Andreas (2014), "Informal Finance: A Theory of Moneylenders", Journal of Development Economics, 107, 157-174.
     

  3. Mookherjee, Dilip and Alberto Motta (2016), "A Theory of Interactions between MFIs and Informal Lenders", Journal of Development Economics, 121, 191-200.
     

  4. * Lilienfeld-Toal, Ulf von, Dilip Mookherjee and Sujata Visaria (2012), "The Distributive Impact of Reforms in Credit Enforcement: Evidence from Indian Debt Recovery Tribunals", Econometrica, 80, 497-558.
     

  5. Burgess, Robin and Rohini Pande (2005), "Do Rural Banks Matter? Evidence from the Indian Social Banking Experiment", American Economic Review, 95, 780-795.
     

  6. Cole, Shawn (2009), "Fixing Market Failures or Fixing Elections? Agricultural Credit in India", American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 1, 219-250.

Micro Finance: Theory and Evidence

  1. Morduch, Jonathan (1999), "The Microfinance Promise", Journal of Economic Literature, 37, 1569-1614.
     

  2. * Besley, Timothy and Stephen Coate (1995), "Group Lending, Repayment Incentives and Social Collateral", Journal of Development Economics, 46, 1-18.
     

  3. * Ghatak, Maitreesh and Timothy W. Guinnane (1999), "The Economics of Lending with Joint Liability: Theory and Practice", Journal of Development Economics, 60, 1-34.
     

  4. * Ghatak, Maitreesh (2000), "Screening by the Company You Keep: Joint Liability Lending and the Peer Selection Effect", Economic Journal, 110, 601-631.
     

  5. * Roy Chowdhury, Prabal (2007), "Group-lending with Sequential Financing, Contingent Renewal and Social Capital", Journal of Development Economics, 84, 487-506.
     

  6. Gine, Xavier and Dean Karlan (2014), "Group versus Individual Liability: Short and Long Term Evidence from Philippine Microcredit Lending Groups", Journal of Development Economics, 107, 65-83.
     

  7. Banerjee, Abhijit, Esther Duflo, Rachel Glennerster, and Cynthia Kinnan (2015), "The Miracle of Microfinance? Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation", American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 7(1), 22-53.
     

  8. Banerjee, Abhijit, Dean Karlan, and Jonathan Zinman (2015), "Six Randomized Evaluations of Microcredit: Introduction and Further Steps," American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, 7(1), 1-21.
     

  9. Banerjee, Abhijit (2012), "Microcredit Under the Microscope: What Have We Learned in the Past Two Decades, and What Do We Need to Know?" Annual Review of Economics, 5 (1).
     

  10. Field, Erica and Rohini Pande (2008), "Repayment Frequency and Default in Micro-finance: Evidence from India", Journal of the European Economic Association, 6, 501-509.
     

  11. Field, Erica, Rohini Pande, John Papp and Natalia Rigol (2013), "Does the Classic Microfinance Model Discourage Entrepreneurship among the Poor? Experimental Evidence from India", American Economic Review, 103(6), 2196-2226.
     

  12. Field, Erica, Rohini Pande and Benjamin Feigenberg (2013), "The Economic Returns to Social Interaction: Experimental Evidence from Microfinance", Review of Economic Studies, 80(4), 1459-1483.

Property Rights

  1. Besley, Timothy (1995), "Property Rights and Investment Incentives: Theory and Evidence from Ghana", Journal of Political Economy, 103, 903-937.
     
  2. Besley, Timothy and Maitreesh Ghatak (2009), "Property Rights and Economic Development", in D. Rodrik and M. Rosenzweig (eds) Handbook of Development Economics, V, North Holland, 2009.
     
  3. * Besley, Timothy, Konrad B. Burchardi and Maitreesh Ghatak (2012), "Incentives and the de Soto Effect", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 127, 237-282.
     
  4. De Soto, Hernando (2000), The Mystery of Capital: Why Capitalism Triumphs in the West and Fails Everywhere Else, New York: Basic Books and London: Bantam Press/Random House.
     
  5. Galiani, Sebastian and Ernesto Schargrodsky (2010), "Property Rights for the Poor: Effects of Land Titling", Journal of Public Economics, 94, 700-729.
     
  6. Wang, Shing-Yi (2012), "Credit Constraints, Job Mobility, and Entrepreneurship: Evidence from a Property Reform in China", Review of Economics and Statistics, 94, 532-551.
     
  7. de Janvry, Alain, Kyle Emerick, Marco Gonzalez-Navarro and Elisabeth Sadoulet (2015), "Delinking Land Rights from Land Use: Certification and Migration in Mexico", American Economic Review, 105(10), 3125-49.
     
  8. Burchardi, Konrad B., Selim Gulesci, Benedetta Lerva, and Munshi Sulaiman (2019): "Moral Hazard: Experimental Evidence from Tenancy Contracts", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 134(1), 281-347.
     
  9. Goldstein, Markus, Kenneth Houngbedji, Florence Kondylis, Michael O'Sullivan, and Harris Selod (2018), "Formalization without Certification? Experimental Evidence on Property Rights and Investment", Journal of Development Economics, 132, 57-74.

Social Networks and Informal Institutions

  1. * Besley, Timothy, Stephen Coate and Glenn Loury (1993), "The Economics of Rotating Savings and Credit Associations", American Economic Review, 83, 792-810.
     
  2. Greif, Avner (1993), "Contract Enforceability and Economic Institutions in Early Trade: The Maghribi Traders' Coalition", American Economic Review, 83, 525-548.
     
  3. * Banerjee, Abhijit and Andrew Newman (1998), "Information, the Dual Economy, and Development", Review of Economic Studies, 65, 631-653.
     
  4. Knack, Stephen and Philip Keefer (1997), "Does Social Capital Have an Economic Payoff? A Cross-Country Investigation", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 112, 1252-1288.
     
  5. Munshi, Kaivan (2003), "Networks in the Modern Economy: Mexican Migrants in the U. S. Labor Market", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 118, 549-599.
     
  6. Munshi, Kaivan (2011), "Labor and Credit Networks in Developing Economies," in J. Benhabib, A. Bissin, and M. O. Jackson, eds. Handbook of Social Economics, New York: Elsevier.

Education: Credit Constraints in Education

  1. * Lochner, Lance and Alexander Monge-Naranjo (2016), "Student Loans and Repayment: Theory, Evidence, and Policy", in Handbook of the Economics of Education, New York: Elsevier, volume 5, 397-478.
     
  2. Lochner, Lance and Alexander Monge-Naranjo (2011), "The Nature of Credit Constraints and Human Capital", American Economic Review, 101 (6), 2487-2529.
     
  3. Hai, Rong and James J. Heckman (2017), "Inequality in Human Capital and Endogenous Credit Constraints", Review of Economic Dynamics, 25, 4-36.
     
  4. Abbott, Brant, Giovanni Gallipoli, Costas Meghir and Giovanni L. Violante (2019), "Education Policy and Intergenerational Transfers in Equilibrium", Journal of Political Economy, 127(6), 2569-2624.
     
  5. Caucutt, Elizabeth M. and Lance Lochner (2020), "Early and Late Human Capital Investments, Borrowing Constraints, and the Family", Journal of Political Economy, 128(3), 1065-1147.
     
  6. Solis, Alex (2017), "Credit Access and College Enrollment", Journal of Political Economy, 125(2), 562-622.

Education: Private and Public Education Choice

  1. Stiglitz, Joseph E. (1974), "The Demand for Education in Public and Private School Systems", Journal of Public Economics, 3, 349-385.
     
  2. Epple, Dennis and Richard E. Romano (1996), "Ends Against the Middle: Determining Public Service Provision when There are Private Alternatives", Journal of Public Economics, 62, 297-325.
     
  3. * Epple, Dennis and Richard E. Romano (1998), "Competition between Private and Public Schools, Vouchers and Peer Group Effects", American Economic Review, 88, 33-62.
     
  4. Gerhard Glomm and B. Ravikumar (1998), "Opting Out of Publicly Provided Services: A Majority Voting Result", Social Choice and Welfare, 15, 187-99.

Discrimination and Affirmative Action

  1. Akerlof, George (1976), "The Economics of Caste and of the Rat Race and Other Woeful Tales", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 90, 599-617.
     
  2. * Coate, Stephen and Glenn Loury (1993), "Will Affirmative-Action Policies Eliminate Negative Stereotypes?" American Economic Review, 83, 1220-1240.
     
  3. * Fang, Hanming and Peter Norman, "Government-Mandated Discriminatory Policies: Theory and Evidence", International Economic Review, 47, 361-389.
     
  4. * Fryer, Roland G. and Glenn Loury (2013), "Valuing Diversity", Journal of Political Economy, 121, 747-774.

The Political Economy of Development

  1. Ray, Debraj (2010), "Uneven Growth: A Framework for Research in Development Economics", Journal of Economic Perspectives, 24, 45-60.
     
  2. Esteban, Joan, Laura Mayoral and Debraj Ray (2012), "Ethnicity and Conflict: Theory and Facts", Science, 336, 858-865.
     
  3. * Mitra, Anirban and Debraj Ray (2014), "Implications of an Economic Theory of Conflict: Hindu-Muslim Violence in India," Journal of Political Economy, 122, 719-765.
     
  4. * Ray, Debraj and Joan Esteban (2017), "Conflict and Development", Annual Review of Economics, 9, 263-293.

Last Updated on 06 February 2022.