Showing papers by "Pushkar Maitra published in 2001"
TL;DR: The authors examined the institutions in rural India that enable households to insure against unanticipated idiosyncratic shocks to income using a decentralized general equilibrium model and found that small farmers are excluded from credit markets.
Abstract: This study examines the institutions in rural India that enable households to insure against unanticipated idiosyncratic shocks to income. Using a decentralized general equilibrium model it tests for consumption and leisure insurance against unanticipated income shocks. It is found that differential access to markets (particularly financial markets) force villagers to differ in their response to similar shocks. Medium and large farmers have unrestricted access to credit markets and are unaffected by unanticipated changes in household income. The small farmers are excluded from credit markets. However, some of the small farmers are able to insure consumption against unanticipated income shocks through compensating changes in labour market participation and reducing own farm work.
16 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the effect of individual, household, and community characteristics on the age at first conception and the number of pregnancies for a national sample of women was examined using unit record data from South Africa.
Abstract: In this article we analyze two aspects of female fertility using unit record data from South Africa. We examine the effect of individual, household, and community characteristics on the age at first conception and the number of pregnancies for a national sample of women. The segmented nature of theeconomy of South Africa allows us to study differences in fertility patterns among the different socioeconomic classes and across the different races. 1 While much has been said about fertility behavior of women in sub-Saharan Africa, an analysis of the fertility patterns of South African women is significantly absent. 2 In this article we attempt to fill this gap in the literature. The first aspect of fertility behavior that we examine is the age at first conception. In addition to the significant biological components associated with the age at first conception there are economic and nonbiological factors that affect the probability of conceiving by influencing the choices that women make (including choices regarding birth control and other family-planning strategies). Age at first conception is modeled using a hazard model. Of particular importance is the effect of the highest level of education attained on the age at first conception. The estimation results show that the more educated a woman is, the higher is the age at first conception subject to a threshold level of education. There are no significant racial differences in the age at first conception. The second aspect of fertility examined is the number of times a woman has been pregnant. Economic theories of fertility assumethatparentsoptimally choose the number of children they want to have, taking into account the costs and benefits associated with a given number of births, including the costs of avoiding unwanted births. Assuming that no pregnancy is unwanted, the number of times a woman is pregnant over her reproductive age can
14 citations
TL;DR: This paper used data from three Indian villages to map from agent and plot-level characteristics to the set of contracts offered on each plot and found that tenants are older than wage labourers.
Abstract: Existing theoretical models of land tenancy predict that more experienced workers will be offered tenancy contracts while the less experienced ones will be offered wage contracts. Using data from three Indian villages we map from the set of agent and plot-level characteristics to the set of contracts offered on each plot. We find that tenants are older than wage labourers. In the set of tenants, older workers tend to be cash renters. Copyright © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
5 citations
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TL;DR: This paper investigates the changes to health care facilities and the nutritional status of Black children during the first 5 years of democratic rule in South Africa.
Abstract: This paper investigates the changes to health care facilities and the nutritional status of Black children during the first 5 years of democratic rule in South Africa.
4 citations
TL;DR: Evidence of significant mutual dependence between birth interval and child survival in both samples is found and part of the difference in behaviour could be explained by differences in female literacy, which highlights the differences in religion and state policies in these two neighbouring states.
Abstract: This paper argues that the duration between successive children affects child survival (the sibling competition effect) while child survival too affects the duration between successive births (the child replacement effect). This inter-relationship is modelled in terms of a correlated simultaneous hazard model to jointly estimate the hazard of child mortality and that of subsequent birth. The analysis is based on the National Family Health Survey (NFHS) 1992-93 household-level data from the Indian province of Punjab and Pakistan Integrated Household Survey (PIHS) 1991 data from the Pakistani Punjab province. Our results support evidence of competition among siblings for limited parental resources so that longer prior and posterior birth spacing lower the hazard of mortality. Parental education has a significant effect on the duration between successive births and there is also some evidence in favour of the son-preference hypothesis. Finally, compared to the 1960s, the hazard of subsequent birth has declined significantly in recent decades in the Indian state, but not so in the Pakistani state, highlighting the differential roles of the political and religious institutions shaping people's attitude towards modern contraception and women's education in the two countries.
3 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the welfare effects of a workfare program in an economy where agents face exogenous income shocks and are unable to insure themselves through private markets are examined, and a dynamic general equilibrium model is calibrated using data from two ICRISAT villages in the Indian state of Maharashtra, which had a functioning EGS.
Abstract: This paper examines the welfare effects of a workfare programme in an economy where agents face exogenous income shocks and are unable to insure themselves through private markets. A dynamic general equilibrium model is calibrated using data from two ICRISAT villages in the Indian state of Maharashtra, which had a functioning Employment Guarantee Scheme (EGS), in the period 1979–84. The optimal wage and the welfare gains of the program depend on how productive the EGS is, relative to the private sector. When agents are paid the optimal wage rate, they do not hold the non-interest-bearing asset for precautionary savings and all insurance is provided by the EGS. There are significant welfare gains from paying the optimal wage rate as opposed to simply paying the marginal product of labour in the EGS.
2 citations
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TL;DR: In this paper, the effect of education on the age at marriage and the duration between marriage and first birth was examined using individual level unit record data from Pakistan, and the authors found that educated women marry significantly later but education does not have any impact on the duration of first birth.
Abstract: A rapid rise in women's education levels, an increase in the age at marriage and an increase in the age at which they have their Þrst child are key features of demographic transition in any country. Education is considered to be an essential component in this process because increases in educational attainment are likely to significantly affect both age at marriage and the duration between marriage and first birth - in particular increasing both the age at marriage and the time to Þrst child. This paper uses individual level unit record data from Pakistan to examine the effect of education on the age at marriage and on the duration between marriage and Þrst birth. We jointly estimate educational attainment, age at marriage and duration between marriage and first birth allowing for household level unobserved heterogeneity. Our estimation results show that ignoring correlation between the heterogeneity terms in the three main variables of interest results in inconsistent estimates. We find that educated women marry signiÞcantly later but education does not have any impact on the duration between marriage and first birth.
2 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors analyse resource and household compositional variables, using an interdependent framework that treats them as jointly endogenous, and provide evidence of fluidity of household structure and point to new hypotheses on its responsiveness to changes in resources and other variables.
Abstract: Economic analysis of household behaviour, usually, assumes that household size and composition are fixed and exogenous. This study departs from this practice by analysing resource and household compositional variables, using an interdependent framework that treats them as jointly endogenous. The study is conducted using panel data set of Black households residing in Kwazulu Natal province in South Africa. The results provide evidence of fluidity of household structure, and point to new hypotheses on its responsiveness to changes in resources and other variables. The results also point to some sharp changes in South Africa between 1993 and 1998 in the direction and magnitude of the impact of several key variables.
1 citations
01 Jan 2001
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examined the extent of consumption insurance against income risk by households in rural India and found that consumption tracks income more closely for the poorer households than the richer ones.
Abstract: This paper examines the extent of consumption insurance against income risk by households in rural India. We estimate the effects of income changes on consumption after controlling for aggregate shocks through changes in village level consumption and household size. We also test whether there is a systematic wealth effect on the extent of consumption insurance against idiosyncratic income shocks by classifying the households on the basis of landholding, which is the primary source of wealth for rural households in India. The null hypothesis of full insurance is rejected both for the population as a whole and for the different land classes. Our estimation results also show that consumption tracks income more closely for the poorer households the estimated marginal propensity to consume out of idiosyncratic changes in income is significantly higher for the poorer households compared to the richer households. The results are robust to alternative estimation methodologies and alternative methods of sample stratification.
1 citations