IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/wbecrv/v34y2020isupplement_1ps72-s78..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is Informal Redistribution Costly? Evidence from a Lab-in-the-Field Experiment in Senegal

Author

Listed:
  • Marie Boltz
  • Karine Marazyan
  • Paola Villar

Abstract

In Sub-Saharan Africa, individuals frequently transfer a substantial share of their resources to members of their social networks. Social pressure to redistribute, however, can induce disincentive effects on resource allocation decisions. This paper measures and characterizes the costs of redistributive pressure by estimating individuals’ willingness to pay (WTP) to hide their income. The study estimates a social tax due to informal redistribution of 10 percent. Moreover, it shows that individuals are willing to escape from the redistributive pressure exerted mainly by extended family members.

Suggested Citation

  • Marie Boltz & Karine Marazyan & Paola Villar, 2020. "Is Informal Redistribution Costly? Evidence from a Lab-in-the-Field Experiment in Senegal," The World Bank Economic Review, World Bank, vol. 34(Supplemen), pages 72-78.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:wbecrv:v:34:y:2020:i:supplement_1:p:s72-s78.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/wber/lhz041
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Boltz, Marie & Marazyan, Karine & Villar, Paola, 2019. "Income hiding and informal redistribution: A lab-in-the-field experiment in Senegal," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 78-92.
    2. Pamela Jakiela & Owen Ozier, 2016. "Does Africa Need a Rotten Kin Theorem? Experimental Evidence from Village Economies," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 83(1), pages 231-268.
    3. Baland, Jean-Marie & Bonjean, Isabelle & Guirkinger, Catherine & Ziparo, Roberta, 2016. "The economic consequences of mutual help in extended families," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 38-56.
    4. Grimm, Michael & Hartwig, Renate & Lay, Jann, 2017. "Does forced solidarity hamper investment in small and micro enterprises?," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 45(4), pages 827-846.
    5. Marie Boltz-Laemmel & Paola Villar, 2013. "Les liens des migrants internes et internationaux à leur ménage d'origine : portraits croisés de familles étendues sénégalaises," PSE-Ecole d'économie de Paris (Postprint) hal-02439586, HAL.
    6. Gonne Beekman & Marcel Gatto & Eleonora Nillesen, 2015. "Family Networks and Income Hiding: Evidence from Lab-in-the-Field Experiments in Rural Liberia," Journal of African Economies, Centre for the Study of African Economies, vol. 24(3), pages 453-469.
    7. Goldberg, Jessica, 2017. "The effect of social pressure on expenditures in Malawi," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 173-185.
    8. Carolina Castilla & Thomas Walker, 2013. "Is Ignorance Bliss? The Effect of Asymmetric Information between Spouses on Intra-household Allocations," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 103(3), pages 263-268, May.
    9. Jean-Marie Baland & Catherine Guirkinger & Charlotte Mali, 2011. "Pretending to Be Poor: Borrowing to Escape Forced Solidarity in Cameroon," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 60(1), pages 1-16.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Boltz, Marie & Marazyan, Karine & Villar, Paola, 2019. "Income hiding and informal redistribution: A lab-in-the-field experiment in Senegal," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 137(C), pages 78-92.
    2. Eliana Carranza & Aletheia Donald & Florian Grosset & Supreet Kaur, 2022. "The Social Tax: Redistributive Pressure and Labor Supply," NBER Working Papers 30438, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    3. Fromell, Hanna & Nosenzo, Daniele & Owens, Trudy & Tufano, Fabio, 2021. "One size does not fit all: Plurality of social norms and saving behavior in Kenya," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 192(C), pages 73-91.
    4. Hanna Fromell & Daniele Nosenzo & Trudy Owens & Fabio Tufano, 2019. "One Size Doesn’t Fit All: Plurality of Social Norms and Saving Behavior in Kenya," Discussion Papers 2019-12, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    5. Jean-Marie Baland & Roberta Ziparo, 2017. "Intra-household bargaining in poor countries," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2017-108, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    6. Deschênes, Sarah & Dumas, Christelle & Lambert, Sylvie, 2020. "Household resources and individual strategies," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    7. Jean-Marie Baland & Roberta Ziparo, 2017. "Intra-household bargaining in poor countries," WIDER Working Paper Series 108, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    8. Di Falco, Salvatore & Feri, Francesco & Pin, Paolo & Vollenweider, Xavier, 2018. "Ties that bind: Network redistributive pressure and economic decisions in village economies," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 123-131.
    9. Pauline Castaing, 2020. "Joint liability and adaptation to climate change: evidence from Burkinabe cooperatives," Post-Print hal-02942129, HAL.
    10. Ingela Alger & Jörgen W. Weibull, 2019. "Evolutionary Models of Preference Formation," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 11(1), pages 329-354, August.
    11. Bulte, Erwin H. & Lensink, Robert & Winkel, Anne B., 2018. "The impact of a gender and business training on income hiding: An experimental study in Vietnam," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 148(C), pages 241-259.
    12. Goldberg, Jessica, 2017. "The effect of social pressure on expenditures in Malawi," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 173-185.
    13. Philippe Alby & Emmanuelle Auriol & Pierre Nguimkeu, 2020. "Does Social Pressure Hinder Entrepreneurship in Africa? The Forced Mutual Help Hypothesis," Economica, London School of Economics and Political Science, vol. 87(346), pages 299-327, April.
    14. Emma Riley, 2024. "Resisting Social Pressure in the Household Using Mobile Money: Experimental Evidence on Microenterprise Investment in Uganda," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 114(5), pages 1415-1447, May.
    15. Steinert, Janina Isabel & Vasumati Satish, Rucha & Stips, Felix & Vollmer, Sebastian, 2022. "Commitment or concealment? Impacts and use of a portable saving device: Evidence from a field experiment in urban India," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 193(C), pages 367-398.
    16. Jérôme Ballet, 2018. "Anthropology and Economics: The Argument for a Microeconomic Anthropology," Cahiers du GREThA (2007-2019) 2018-14, Groupe de Recherche en Economie Théorique et Appliquée (GREThA).
    17. Ingela Alger & Laura Juarez & Miriam Juarez-Torres & Josepa Miquel-Florensa, 2020. "Do Informal Transfers Induce Lower Efforts? Evidence from Lab-in-the-Field Experiments in Rural Mexico," Economic Development and Cultural Change, University of Chicago Press, vol. 69(1), pages 107-171.
    18. World Bank Group, 2015. "Tanzania Mainland Poverty Assessment," World Bank Publications - Reports 22021, The World Bank Group.
    19. Margherita Calderone, 2017. "Are there different spillover effects from cash transfers to men and women? Impacts on investments in education in post-war Uganda," WIDER Working Paper Series 093, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    20. Gazeaud, Jules & Khan, Nausheen & Mvukiyehe, Eric & Sterck, Olivier, 2023. "With or without him? Experimental evidence on cash grants and gender-sensitive trainings in Tunisia," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 165(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:oup:wbecrv:v:34:y:2020:i:supplement_1:p:s72-s78.. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/wrldbus.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.