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Michael Kremer

Bio: Michael Kremer is an academic researcher from Harvard University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Population & Physics. The author has an hindex of 78, co-authored 294 publications receiving 29375 citations. Previous affiliations of Michael Kremer include National Bureau of Economic Research & Center for Global Development.


Papers
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TL;DR: In this article, the authors evaluate a Kenyan project in which school-based mass treatment with deworming drugs was randomly phased into schools, rather than to individuals, allowing estimation of overall program effects.
Abstract: This brief summarizes worms: identifying impacts on education and health in the presence of treatment externalities in Kenya for the period 1998-99. Intestinal helminthes includes hookworm, roundworm, whipworm, and schistoso-miasis-infect more than one-quarter of the world's population. Studies in which medical treatment is randomized at the individual level potentially doubly underestimate the benefits of treatment, missing externality benefits to the comparison group from reduced disease transmission, and therefore also underestimating benefits for the treatment group. The author evaluate a Kenyan project in which school-based mass treatment with deworming drugs was randomly phased into schools, rather than to individuals, allowing estimation of overall program effects. The program reduced school absenteeism in treatment schools by one-quarter, and was far cheaper than alternative ways of boosting school participation. Deworming substantially improved health and school participation among untreated children in both treatment schools and neighboring schools and these externalities are large enough to justify fully subsidizing treatment.

2,020 citations

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TL;DR: In this paper, a production function describing processes subject to mistakes in any of several tasks is proposed, which is consistent with large income differences between countries, the predominance of small firms in poor countries, and the positive correlation between the wages of workers in different occupations within enterprises.
Abstract: This paper proposes a production function describing processes subject to mistakes in any of several tasks. It shows that high-skill workers-those who make few mistakes-will be matched together in equilibrium, and that wages and output will rise steeply in skill. The model is consistent with large income differences between countries, the predominance of small firms in poor countries, and the positive correlation between the wages of workers in different occupations within enterprises. Imperfect observability of skill leads to imperfect matching and thus to spillovers, strategic complementarity, and multiple equilibria in education. Many production processes consist of a series of tasks, mistakes in any of which can dramatically reduce the product's value. The space shuttle Challenger had thousands of components: it exploded because it was launched at a temperature that caused one of those components, the O-rings, to malfunction. "Irregular" garments with slight imperfections sell at half price. Companies can fail due to bad marketing, even if the product design, manufacturing, and accounting are excellent. This paper argues that the analysis of such processes can help explain several stylized facts in development and labor economics. The first section of the paper proposes a production function in which production consists of many tasks, all of which must be successfully completed for the product to have full value. I assume that it is not possible to substitute several low-skill workers for one high-skill worker, where skill refers to the probability a worker will successfully complete a task. Subsection I.1 solves for equilibrium wages as a function of worker skill under this production function, and shows that firms will match together workers of similar skill. Subsection I.2 argues that this production function is consistent with a series of stylized facts in development and labor economics, including the enormity of wage and productivity differences between rich and poor countries and the positive correlation between wages of workers in different occupations within firms. A variant of the model in which tasks are performed sequentially implies that the share of agriculture in GNP will fall with development.

1,617 citations

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TL;DR: The nonrivalry of technology as modeled in the endogenous growth literature implies that high population spurs technological change as discussed by the authors, and the Malthusian assumption that technology limits population predicts that over most of history the growth rate of population will be proportional to its level.
Abstract: The nonrivalry of technology as modeled in the endogenous growth literature implies that high population spurs technological change. This paper constructs and empirically tests a model of long-run world population growth combining this implication with the Malthusian assumption that technology limits population. The model predicts that over most of history the growth rate of population will be proportional to its level. Empirical tests support this prediction and show that historically among societies with no possibility for technological contact those with larger initial populations have had faster technological change and population growth. (EXCERPT)

1,389 citations

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TL;DR: Surveys in which enumerators make unannounced visits to primary schools and health clinics in Bangladesh, Ecuador, India, Indonesia, Peru and Uganda and recorded whether they found teachers and health workers in the facilities are reported.
Abstract: In this paper, we report results from surveys in which enumerators make unannounced visits to primary schools and health clinics in Bangladesh, Ecuador, India, Indonesia, Peru and Uganda and recorded whether they found teachers and health workers in the facilities.

1,205 citations

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TL;DR: In this article, the authors model farmers as facing small fixed costs of purchasing fertilizer, and assume some are stochastically present-biased and not fully sophisticated about this bias, such farmers may procrastinate, postponing fertilizer purchases until later periods, when they may be too impatient to purchase fertilizer.
Abstract: While many developing-country policymakers see heavy fertilizer subsidies as critical to raising agricultural productivity, most economists see them as distortionary, regressive, environmentally unsound, and argue that they result in politicized, inefficient distribution of fertilizer supply. We model farmers as facing small fixed costs of purchasing fertilizer, and assume some are stochastically present-biased and not fully sophisticated about this bias. Even when relatively patient, such farmers may procrastinate, postponing fertilizer purchases until later periods, when they may be too impatient to purchase fertilizer. Consistent with the model, many farmers in Western Kenya fail to take advantage of apparently profitable fertilizer investments, but they do invest in response to small, time-limited discounts on the cost of acquiring fertilizer (free delivery) just after harvest. Later discounts have a smaller impact, and when given a choice of price schedules, many farmers choose schedules that induce advance purchase. Calibration suggests such small, time-limited discounts yield higher welfare than either laissez faire or heavy subsidies by helping present-biased farmers commit to fertilizer use without inducing those with standard preferences to substantially overuse fertilizer.

931 citations


Cited by
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TL;DR: This paper showed that differences in physical capital and educational attainment can only partially explain the variation in output per worker, and that a large amount of variation in the level of the Solow residual across countries is driven by differences in institutions and government policies.
Abstract: Output per worker varies enormously across countries. Why? On an accounting basis, our analysis shows that differences in physical capital and educational attainment can only partially explain the variation in output per worker--we find a large amount of variation in the level of the Solow residual across countries. At a deeper level, we document that the differences in capital accumulation, productivity, and therefore output per worker are driven by differences in institutions and government policies, which we call social infrastructure. We treat social infrastructure as endogenous, determined historically by location and other factors captured in part by language.

7,208 citations

ReportDOI
TL;DR: This paper examined whether financial development facilitates economic growth by scrutinizing one rationale for such a relationship; that financial development reduces the costs of external finance to firms, and found that industrial sectors that are relatively more in need of foreign finance develop disproportionately faster in countries with more developed financial markets.
Abstract: Does finance affect economic growth? A number of studies have identified a positive correlation between the level of development of a country's financial sector and the rate of growth of its per capita income. As has been noted elsewhere, the observed correlation does not necessarily imply a causal relationship. This paper examines whether financial development facilitates economic growth by scrutinizing one rationale for such a relationship; that financial development reduces the costs of external finance to firms. Specifically, we ask whether industrial sectors that are relatively more in need of external finance develop disproportionately faster in countries with more developed financial markets. We find this to be true in a large sample of countries over the 1980s. We show this result is unlikely to be driven by omitted variables, outliers, or reverse causality.

6,815 citations

Journal ArticleDOI
TL;DR: This article showed that the differences in capital accumulation, productivity, and therefore output per worker are driven by differences in institutions and government policies, which are referred to as social infrastructure and called social infrastructure as endogenous, determined historically by location and other factors captured by language.
Abstract: Output per worker varies enormously across countries. Why? On an accounting basis our analysis shows that differences in physical capital and educational attainment can only partially explain the variation in output per worker—we find a large amount of variation in the level of the Solow residual across countries. At a deeper level, we document that the differences in capital accumulation, productivity, and therefore output per worker are driven by differences in institutions and government policies, which we call social infrastructure. We treat social infrastructure as endogenous, determined historically by location and other factors captured in part by language. In 1988 output per worker in the United States was more than 35 times higher than output per worker in Niger. In just over ten days the average worker in the United States produced as much as an average worker in Niger produced in an entire year. Explaining such vast differences in economic performance is one of the fundamental challenges of economics. Analysis based on an aggregate production function provides some insight into these differences, an approach taken by Mankiw, Romer, and Weil [1992] and Dougherty and Jorgenson [1996], among others. Differences among countries can be attributed to differences in human capital, physical capital, and productivity. Building on their analysis, our results suggest that differences in each element of the production function are important. In particular, however, our results emphasize the key role played by productivity. For example, consider the 35-fold difference in output per worker between the United States and Niger. Different capital intensities in the two countries contributed a factor of 1.5 to the income differences, while different levels of educational attainment contributed a factor of 3.1. The remaining difference—a factor of 7.7—remains as the productivity residual. * A previous version of this paper was circulated under the title ‘‘The Productivity of Nations.’’ This research was supported by the Center for Economic Policy Research at Stanford and by the National Science Foundation under grants SBR-9410039 (Hall) and SBR-9510916 (Jones) and is part of the National Bureau of Economic Research’s program on Economic Fluctuations and Growth. We thank Bobby Sinclair for excellent research assistance and colleagues too numerous to list for an outpouring of helpful commentary. Data used in the paper are available online from http://www.stanford.edu/,chadj.

6,454 citations

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TL;DR: As an example of how the current "war on terrorism" could generate a durable civic renewal, Putnam points to the burst in civic practices that occurred during and after World War II, which he says "permanently marked" the generation that lived through it and had a "terrific effect on American public life over the last half-century."
Abstract: The present historical moment may seem a particularly inopportune time to review Bowling Alone, Robert Putnam's latest exploration of civic decline in America. After all, the outpouring of volunteerism, solidarity, patriotism, and self-sacrifice displayed by Americans in the wake of the September 11 terrorist attacks appears to fly in the face of Putnam's central argument: that \"social capital\" -defined as \"social networks and the norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness that arise from them\" (p. 19)'has declined to dangerously low levels in America over the last three decades. However, Putnam is not fazed in the least by the recent effusion of solidarity. Quite the contrary, he sees in it the potential to \"reverse what has been a 30to 40-year steady decline in most measures of connectedness or community.\"' As an example of how the current \"war on terrorism\" could generate a durable civic renewal, Putnam points to the burst in civic practices that occurred during and after World War II, which he says \"permanently marked\" the generation that lived through it and had a \"terrific effect on American public life over the last half-century.\" 3 If Americans can follow this example and channel their current civic

5,309 citations