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

Dean Karlan, Nava Ashraf and Wesley Yin

No 6195, CEPR Discussion Papers from Centre for Economic Policy Research

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)
Date: 2007-03
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev, nep-mfd and nep-sea
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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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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