Group versus Individual Liability: A Field Experiment in the Philippines

Xavier Gine and Dean Karlan

No 6193, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: Group liability is often portrayed as the key innovation that led to the explosion of the microcredit movement, which started with the Grameen Bank in the 1970s and continues on today with hundreds of institutions around the world. Group lending claims to improve repayment rates and lower transaction costs when lending to the poor by providing incentives for peers to screen, monitor and enforce each other?s loans. However, some argue that group liability creates excessive pressure and discourages good clients from borrowing, jeopardizing both growth and sustainability. Therefore, it remains unclear whether group liability improves the lender?s overall profitability and the poor?s access to financial markets. We worked with a bank in the Philippines to conduct a field experiment to examine these issues. We randomly assigned half of the 169 pre-existing group liability 'centres' of approximately twenty women to individual-liability centres (treatment) and kept the other half as-is with group liability (control). We find that the conversion to individual liability does not affect the repayment rate, and leads to higher growth in centre size by attracting new clients.

Keywords: Group liability; Informal economies; Joint liability; Microfinance; Micro-enterprises; Social capital (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C93 D71 D82 D91 O12 O16 O17 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev, nep-exp, nep-mfd, nep-sea and nep-soc
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Group Versus Individual Liability: A Field Experiment in the Philippines (2007)
Working Paper: Group versus Individual Liability: A Field Experiment in the Philippines (2006)
Working Paper: Group versus Individual Liability: A Field Experiment in the Philippines (2006)
Working Paper: Group versus individual liability: A field experiment in the philippines (2006)
Working Paper: Group versus individual liability: a field experiment in the Philippines (2006)
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