Female Empowerment: Impact of a Commitment Savings Product in the Philippines*

Dean Karlan, Nava Ashraf and Wesley Yin

No 106, Working Papers from Center for Global Development

Abstract: Female “empowerment” has increasingly become a policy goal, both as an end to itself and as a means to achieving other development goals. Microfinance in particular has often been argued, but not without controversy, to be a tool for empowering women. Here, using a randomized controlled trial, we examine whether access to an individually-held commitment savings product leads to an increase in female decision-making power within the household. We find positive impacts, particularly for women who have below median decision-making power in the baseline, and we find this leads to a shift towards female-oriented durables goods purchased in the household.

Keywords: savings; microfinance; female empowerment; household decision making; commitment (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D12 D63 D91 J16 O12 O16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 27 pages
Date: 2007-01
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev and nep-mfd
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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http://www.cgdev.org/content/publications/detail/12332

Related works:
Journal Article: Female Empowerment: Impact of a Commitment Savings Product in the Philippines (2010)
Working Paper: Female Empowerment: Impact of a Commitment Savings Product in the Philippines (2007)
Working Paper: Female Empowerment: Impact of a Commitment Savings Product in the Philippines (2006)
Working Paper: Female Empowerment: Impact of a Commitment Savings Product in the Philippines (2006)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cgd:wpaper:106

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