Disability-Inclusive Livelihoods and Household Economic Well-Being: Experimental Evidence from Northern Uganda

We study whether a disability-inclusive, ultra-poor graduation programme (DIG) improves the well-being of ultra-poor households with people with disabilities. We randomly allocate ultra-poor households across four districts of northern Uganda to either the DIG program or the control condition. DIG households received short-term cash transfers, a productive asset, training, and mentorship on using the asset for income generation, as well as access to village loan and savings groups, and necessary healthcare and assistive devices. We estimate the program's impacts three months after completion using survey data that cover households with at least one person with a disability. We find that the DIG program more than doubles household assets and increases annual household incomes and expenditures by about 19\%. Moreover, these impacts are similar, or in some cases slightly higher, when the main project participant is a person with a disability compared to other household members. We conjecture that designating a person with a disability as the main project participant increases disability salience, which in turn crowds in external support and induces positive behavioural adjustments within the household.