All Outputs (15)

Benefits of enhanced access to education in Tanzania (2023)
Journal Article

Motivation Expanding access to education is a desirable policy. Tanzania implemented Universal Primary Education (UPE) in 2001 and expanded secondary education in 2006. However, evidence that UPE delivers benefits in educational attainment or earnin... Read More about Benefits of enhanced access to education in Tanzania.

One size does not fit all: Plurality of social norms and saving behavior in Kenya (2021)
Journal Article

Using the Krupka–Weber norm-elicitation technique in a lab-in-the-field experiment in rural Kenya, we measure the social norms that regulate the trade-off between wealth accumulation through saving and sharing income with kin and neighbors. We find a... Read More about One size does not fit all: Plurality of social norms and saving behavior in Kenya.

Disability in Uganda: a medical intervention to measure gendered impacts on functional independence and labour-market outcomes (2021)
Journal Article

Using data from an orthotic intervention in Kampala, Uganda, this paper estimates the health and economic impacts of providing orthotic equipment to adults with lower limb disabilities. We examine changes to: (i) functional mobility and (ii) labour m... Read More about Disability in Uganda: a medical intervention to measure gendered impacts on functional independence and labour-market outcomes.

Do Better-Performing Nongovernmental Organizations Report More Accurately? Evidence from Financial Accounts in Uganda (2020)
Journal Article
Burger, R., Dang, C. T., & Owens, T. (2021). Do Better-Performing Nongovernmental Organizations Report More Accurately? Evidence from Financial Accounts in Uganda. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 69(2), 789-828. https://doi.org/10.1086/703099

We use Benford’s Law to investigate inaccurate financial reports of a representative sample of Ugandan nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). We find that 25% of the sample provided information that did not conform to the Benford distribution, suggest... Read More about Do Better-Performing Nongovernmental Organizations Report More Accurately? Evidence from Financial Accounts in Uganda.

Collective management of an environmental threat when exposure is heterogeneous: A complementary methods approach (2020)
Journal Article

We adopt a complementary methods approach to investigate whether and how heterogeneity in individual returns to a public good affects public good provision. We engage smallholder farmers in Sri Lanka in: a one-shot, framed, lab-in-the-field experimen... Read More about Collective management of an environmental threat when exposure is heterogeneous: A complementary methods approach.

Risk taking and sharing when risk exposure is interdependent (2020)
Journal Article

© 2020 Elsevier B.V. Using a specially designed experiment, we investigate whether and how interdependence in risk exposure, i.e., risk taking by some members of a potential risk sharing group affecting not only their own but also their co-members' r... Read More about Risk taking and sharing when risk exposure is interdependent.

Does transparency come at the cost of charitable services? Evidence from investigating British charities (2020)
Journal Article

Recent high-profile scandals related to misuse of funding and donations have raised the demand for scrutiny over financial transparency and operational activities of non-profit organizations in developed countries. Our analysis challenges the common... Read More about Does transparency come at the cost of charitable services? Evidence from investigating British charities.

Altruism, fast and slow? Evidence from a meta-analysis and a new experiment (2020)
Journal Article

Can we use the lens of dual-system theories to explain altruistic behavior? In recent years this question has attracted the interest of both economists and psychologists. We contribute to this emerging literature by reporting the results of a meta-st... Read More about Altruism, fast and slow? Evidence from a meta-analysis and a new experiment.

Are Victims Truly Worse Off in the Presence of Bystanders? Revisiting the Bystander Effect (2019)
Journal Article

Previous studies have shown that individuals are less likely to help a person in need when there are “bystanders” present who can also offer help. We designed an experiment to re-examine this “bystander effect” using modified dictator games. We find... Read More about Are Victims Truly Worse Off in the Presence of Bystanders? Revisiting the Bystander Effect.

Hedonic adaptation to treatment: evidence from a medical intervention (2019)
Journal Article

We investigate whether changes in life circumstances lead to long-lasting changes in subjective well-being using a medical intervention that provided orthotic equipment to Ugandan adults with lower limb disabilities. The intervention had a positive e... Read More about Hedonic adaptation to treatment: evidence from a medical intervention.

Global non-profit chains and the challenges of development aid contracting (2018)
Journal Article

This paper employs Oliver Williamson’s transaction cost approach to assess contracting. We find that donor contracting with global non-profit chains is conducive to NPO opportunism due to the asset specificity of the contracts, infrequent contracting... Read More about Global non-profit chains and the challenges of development aid contracting.

Female job satisfaction: can we explain the part-time puzzle? (2016)
Journal Article
Bridges, S., & Owens, T. (2017). Female job satisfaction: can we explain the part-time puzzle?. Oxford Economic Papers, 69(3), 782-808. https://doi.org/10.1093/oep/gpw064

Although it is generally accepted that women who work part-time are, on average, more satisfied in their jobs than their full-time counterparts, this is unlikely to be true for all women. Using the British Household Panel Survey we estimate the deter... Read More about Female job satisfaction: can we explain the part-time puzzle?.

‘I Know My Rights, but Am I Better Off?’: Institutions and Disability in Uganda (2015)
Journal Article
Owens, T., & Torrance, S. (2016). ‘I Know My Rights, but Am I Better Off?’: Institutions and Disability in Uganda. Journal of Development Studies, 52(1), 22-35. https://doi.org/10.1080/00220388.2015.1081174

Uganda is internationally recognised for both its legal and constitutional provisions for people with disabilities, and the presence of disabled persons’ organisations that provide informal advocacy and support. Using a unique dataset of 579 Ugandans... Read More about ‘I Know My Rights, but Am I Better Off?’: Institutions and Disability in Uganda.

A model of nongovernmental organization regulation with an application to Uganda (2015)
Journal Article
Burger, R., Dasgupta, I., & Owens, T. (2015). A model of nongovernmental organization regulation with an application to Uganda. Economic Development and Cultural Change, 64(1), https://doi.org/10.1086/682885

We develop a model of regulation of service-delivery nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), where future grants are conditional on prior spending of some minimal proportion of current revenue on direct project-related expenses. Such regulation induces... Read More about A model of nongovernmental organization regulation with an application to Uganda.

Why pay NGOs to involve the community? (2015)
Journal Article
Burger, R., Dasgupta, I., & Owens, T. (2015). Why pay NGOs to involve the community?. Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, 86(1), https://doi.org/10.1111/apce.12065

We examine the case for donors providing financial incentives to, i.e. subsidizing, NGOs to increase community participation. We show that the introduction of such a ‘participation subsidy’ may reduce beneficiary welfare. Thus, eliminating community... Read More about Why pay NGOs to involve the community?.