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Data and policy decisions: Experimental evidence from Pakistan

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  • Callen, Michael
Abstract
We evaluate a program in Pakistan that equips government health inspectors with a smartphone app which channels data on rural clinics to senior policy makers. The system led to rural clinics being inspected 104% more often after 6 months, but only 43.8% more often after a year, with the latter estimate not attaining significance at conventional levels. There is also no clear evidence that the increase in inspections led to increases in general staff attendance. In addition, we test whether senior officials act on the information provided by the system. Focusing only on districts where the app is deployed, we find that highlighting poorly performing facilities on a dashboard viewed by supervisors raises doctor attendance by 75%. Our results indicate that technology may be able to mobilize data to useful effect, even in low capacity settings.

Suggested Citation

  • Callen, Michael, 2020. "Data and policy decisions: Experimental evidence from Pakistan," CEPR Discussion Papers 15169, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:15169
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    7. Michael Callen & James D. Long, 2015. "Institutional Corruption and Election Fraud: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Afghanistan," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(1), pages 354-381, January.
    8. Adnan Q. Khan & Asim I. Khwaja & Benjamin A. Olken, 2016. "Tax Farming Redux: Experimental Evidence on Performance Pay for Tax Collectors," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 131(1), pages 219-271.
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    Cited by:

    1. Sultan Mehmood & Bakhtawar Ali, 2024. "Judicial Capture," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 134(659), pages 1287-1301.
    2. Kalaj, Jozefina & Rogger, Daniel & Somani, Ravi, 2022. "Bureaucrat time-use: Evidence from a survey experiment," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 152(C).
    3. Callen, Michael & Gulzar, Saad & Hasanain, Ali & Khan, Muhammad Yasir & Rezaee, Arman, 2023. "The political economy of public sector absence," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 218(C).
    4. Shuguang Jiang & Marie Claire Villeval, 2022. "Dishonesty in Developing Countries -What Can We Learn From Experiments?," Working Papers hal-03899654, HAL.
    5. Yuehao Bai & Meng Hsuan Hsieh & Jizhou Liu & Max Tabord-Meehan, 2022. "Revisiting the Analysis of Matched-Pair and Stratified Experiments in the Presence of Attrition," Papers 2209.11840, arXiv.org, revised Oct 2023.
    6. Harris, Donna & Borcan , Oana & Serra, Danila & Telli, Henry & Schettini, Bruno & Dercon, Stefan, 2024. "Proud to Belong: The Impact of Ethics Training on Police Officers in Ghana," CEPR Discussion Papers 19141, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    7. Eric Rougier & François Combarnous & Yves-André Fauré, 2022. "Political turnover, public employment, and local economic development: New empirical evidence on the impact of local political dynasties in the Brazilian “Nordeste”," The European Journal of Development Research, Palgrave Macmillan;European Association of Development Research and Training Institutes (EADI), vol. 34(4), pages 2069-2097, August.
    8. Donna Harris & Oana Borcan & Danila Serra & Henry Telli & Bruno Schettini & Stefan Dercon, 2022. "Proud to belong: The impact of ethics training on police officers," CSAE Working Paper Series 2022-05, Centre for the Study of African Economies, University of Oxford.
    9. Ernesto Dal Bó & Frederico Finan & Nicholas Y. Li & Laura Schechter, 2021. "Information Technology and Government Decentralization: Experimental Evidence From Paraguay," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 89(2), pages 677-701, March.
    10. Yuehao Bai & Meng Hsuan Hsieh & Jizhou Liu & Max Tabord‐Meehan, 2024. "Revisiting the analysis of matched‐pair and stratified experiments in the presence of attrition," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 39(2), pages 256-268, March.
    11. Gallegos, Sebastian & Roseth, Benjamin & Cuesta, Ana & Sánchez, Mario, 2023. "Increasing the take-up of public health services: An at-scale experiment on digital government," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 227(C).

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    Keywords

    Bureaucracies; Data-informed policy; Information communication technology; Health;
    All these keywords.

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