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Optimal Risk Sharing Under Limited Commitment: Evidence From Rural Vietnam

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  • Patrick Eozenou

    () (European University Institute, Villa San Paolo, Via Della Piazzuola 43, 50133 Florence, Italy)

Abstract

We use panel data from a household survey conducted in Vietnam to analyze the effectiveness of informal risk sharing arrangements in protecting household consumption from idiosyncratic income shocks. We focus on the effects of reported harvest shocks and of estimated shocks to agricultural revenues on adult equivalent consumption. The full-insurance allocation is tested against a specified alternative under which contracts are not fully enforceable ex-post. We find that farmers hit by unfavorable events stabilize their consumption level below the village aggregate level, irrespective of the level of realized shocks. At the same time, farmers experiencing more favorable shocks enjoy higher consumption in proportion to the realized value of idiosyncratic shocks. Together, these finding are consistent with a simple 2-period model of optimal risk sharing with one-sided limited commitment. These results hold for total consumption and for non-durable consumption. We also find however some evidence supporting the full insurance hypothesis for food consumption.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Development and Policies Research Center (DEPOCEN), Vietnam in its series Working Papers with number 06.

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Length: 34 pages
Date of creation: 2009
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:dpc:wpaper:0609

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Keywords: Consumption; Risk-sharing; Informal Insurance; Vietnam.;

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  1. Coate, Stephen & Ravallion, Martin, 1993. "Reciprocity without commitment : Characterization and performance of informal insurance arrangements," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 40(1), pages 1-24, February.
  2. Dercon, Stefan & Krishnan, Pramila, 2002. "Risk Sharing and Public Transfers," Working Papers UNU-WIDER Research Paper , World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
  3. Robert M. Townsend, . "Risk and Insurance in Village India," University of Chicago - Population Research Center 91-3a, Chicago - Population Research Center.
  4. Battese, G E & Coelli, T J, 1995. "A Model for Technical Inefficiency Effects in a Stochastic Frontier Production Function for Panel Data," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 20(2), pages 325-32.
  5. Ethan Ligon & Jonathan P. Thomas & Tim Worrall, 2002. "Informal Insurance Arrangements with Limited Commitment: Theory and Evidence from Village Economies," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 69(1), pages 209-244.
  6. White, Howard & Masset, Edoardo, 2002. "Child poverty in Vietnam: using adult equivalence scales to estimate income-poverty for different age groups," MPRA Paper 777, University Library of Munich, Germany.
  7. Pagan, Adrian, 1984. "Econometric Issues in the Analysis of Regressions with Generated Regressors," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 25(1), pages 221-47, February.
  8. Attanasio, Orazio & Rios-Rull, Jose-Victor, 2000. "Consumption smoothing in island economies: Can public insurance reduce welfare?," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 44(7), pages 1225-1258, June.
  9. Martin Ravallion & Shubham Chaudhuri, 1997. "Risk and Insurance in Village India: Comment," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 65(1), pages 171-184, January.
  10. Cochrane, John H, 1991. "A Simple Test of Consumption Insurance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(5), pages 957-76, October.
  11. Mace, Barbara J, 1991. "Full Insurance in the Presence of Aggregate Uncertainty," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(5), pages 928-56, October.
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Cited by:
  1. Broer, Tobias, 2011. "The wrong shape of insurance? What cross-sectional distributions tell us about models of consumption-smoothing," CEPR Discussion Papers 8701, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.

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