Can basic entrepreneurship transform the economic lives of the poor?

Bandiera, Oriana ORCID: 0009-0002-6817-793X, Das, Narayan, Burgess, Robin ORCID: 0009-0002-1187-3248, Gulesci, Selim, Sulaiman, Munshi and Rasul, Imran (2013) Can basic entrepreneurship transform the economic lives of the poor? Economic Organisation and Public Policy Discussion Papers (EOPP 043). Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, London, UK.

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Abstract

The world’s poorest people lack capital and skills and toil for others in occupations that others shun. Using a large-scale and long-term randomized control trial in Bangladesh this paper demonstrates that sizable transfers of assets and skills enable the poorest women to shift out of agricultural labor and into running small businesses. This shift, which persists and strengthens after assistance is withdrawn, leads to a 38% increase in earnings. Inculcating basic entrepreneurship, where severely disadvantaged women take on occupations which were the preserve of non-poor women, is shown to be a powerful means of transforming the economic lives of the poor.

Item Type:	Monograph (Report)
Official URL:	http://sticerd.lse.ac.uk/
Additional Information:	© 2013 The Authors
Divisions:	Economics STICERD International Growth Centre
Subjects:	H Social Sciences > HB Economic Theory
Date Deposited:	21 Jul 2014 08:30
Last Modified:	01 Nov 2024 05:05
Funders:	Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC), Challenging the Frontier of Poverty Reduction/Targeting Ultra Poor (CFPR/TUP), Department for International Development (DFID)
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/58032

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