Augmenting State Capacity for Child Development: Experimental Evidence from India

Alejandro J. Ganimian, Karthik Muralidharan and Christopher Walters

No 28780, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: We use a large-scale randomized experiment to study the impact of augmenting staffing in the world’s largest public early childhood program: India’s Integrated Child Development Services (ICDS). Adding a half-time worker doubled net preschool instructional time and led to 0.29σ and 0.46σ increases in math and language test scores after 18 months for children who remained enrolled in the program. Rates of stunting and severe malnutrition were also lower in the treatment group. A cost-benefit analysis suggests that the benefits of augmenting ICDS staffing are likely to significantly exceed its costs even under conservative assumptions.

JEL-codes: C93 I21 I22 I25 O15 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021-05
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-dev and nep-exp
Note: CH DEV ED LS PE
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (9)

Published as Alejandro J. Ganimian & Karthik Muralidharan & Christopher R. Walters, 2024. "Augmenting State Capacity for Child Development: Experimental Evidence from India," Journal of Political Economy, vol 132(5), pages 1565-1602.

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