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Erschienen in: Journal of Quantitative Economics 2/2019

18.08.2018 | Original Article

Local Leadership and Public Good: Evidence from The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in India

verfasst von: Ronit Mukherji

Erschienen in: Journal of Quantitative Economics | Ausgabe 2/2019

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Abstract

The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme is unique in combining self-selection of beneficiaries through demand for work and decentralization of administrative power at the local level. However it falls into a pitfall associated with the decentralization mechanism: that of capture of funds by local leaders. Using nationally representative data I find how households which are closer to local leaders do much better in the NREG scheme during the different stages of its implementation as compared to households who are not. They have more job cards, they tend to work, among those working work more days and get faster wage payments. I argue how this is a result of favouritism by these local leaders leading to capture of funds.

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Fußnoten
1
The World Bank, in 2011 based on 2005's PPPs International Comparison Program estimated 23.6% of Indian population to be below the poverty line.
 
2
More details in section on literature review.
 
3
The first draft of the scheme saw the guarantee of a minimum of 100 days of employment to a household. Propositions have been floated on increasing this to 150 days.
 
4
A Gram Panchayat is, typically, a conglomeration of geographically contiguous villages. The number of villages in a Gram Panchayat can vary from 1 to sometimes as many as 10 villages.
 
5
Evidence, reported in a blog (http://​www.​ideasforindia.​in/​article.​aspx?​article_​id=​29) suggests this may well be the case.
 
6
Speaking to a supervisor and surveyor of IHDS-2011-12, households were explicitly told to differentiate between being close to a local leader versus being related to one.
 
7
The father of the nation Mahatma Gandhi was proponent of the these institutions and firmly believed in them becoming a part of the growth process.
 
9
Four years after it was introduced, the UPA led government decided to rename its flagship rural employment programme after Mahatma Gandhi. I will henceforth, use the more popular name NREGS.
 
10
As specified in the NREGS guidelines. Done to encourage female labour force participation in rural India.
 
11
District level head is the Zila head or the head of the Zila Panchayat. In India district is called Zila.
 
12
Individuals can classify their jobs to be either casual or permanent in nature. Casual jobs are usually for less than 6 months.
 
13
The paper uses a theoretical setting to obtain the results.
 
14
Similar observation from Bardhan and Mookherjee (2006).
 
15
This is around 6.42 Billion USD at PPP.
 
16
Collection of villages makes a block and a few blocks together makes a district.
 
17
Each household is guaranteed a minimum of 100 days of employment. However eligibility also brings in interest of working for all the 100 days. If a person work can work for 100 days but works for only 50 as he is not interested in working all he days, he is coded as working all the eligible days. There is a 3% sample among those doing NREGS jobs who work for more than 100 days.
 
19
The surveyor asking questions about other members to the head of the household is a common practise in India. The National sample Survey is conducted in a similar format and so are various other independent surveys.
 
20
Social groups are categorised primarily into- (Christian, Jain, Sikhs) which is the base category and has the fewest people in the sample. Brahmins, Schedules castes, Schedules tribes, Other backward Castes and Muslims are other groups.
 
21
IHDS dataset does not survey each and every district. It however goes to 372 districts and is considered as nationally representative.
 
22
Village is obtained by concatenating state district and area codes.
 
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Metadaten
Titel
Local Leadership and Public Good: Evidence from The National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme in India
verfasst von
Ronit Mukherji
Publikationsdatum
18.08.2018
Verlag
Springer India
Erschienen in
Journal of Quantitative Economics / Ausgabe 2/2019
Print ISSN: 0971-1554
Elektronische ISSN: 2364-1045
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1007/s40953-018-0138-3

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