Assessing the Effectiveness of Financial Coaching: Evidence from the Boston Youth Credit Building Initiative

Since the 2008 financial crisis, there has been renewed interest in providing financial education to improve consumer financial decision making, especially among youth. Using a randomized controlled trial, we estimate the causal effects of a financial coaching program for young adults from linked individual‐level administrative credit reports and self‐reported survey responses. Within six months, the treatment group was 10 percentage points more likely to have access to credit compared to the control group. After 18 months, the average credit score was 26 points higher for the treatment group versus the control group, raising the likelihood of achieving a “good” credit rating by 8 percentage points. Consequently, the treatment group was less likely to rely on alternative financial services and paid lower interest rates on car loans. These impacts are largely driven by improvements in self‐efficacy, offering important insights for policymakers seeking to incorporate financial education into youth workforce development programs.     

Empirical study relating macroeconomic literacy and rational thinking

We analyze macroeconomic literacy by insights from behavioral economics, while incorporating individual differences in gender, cognitive ability and academic institution. Our sample consists of economic students from two academic institutions in Israel. For statistical analysis, we used Generalized Estimating Equations (GEE). Our main finding is that high-level male students who are prone toward mental accounting have very accurate expectations of inflation, interest rate and unemployment, i.e. they are highly macroeconomic literate. Yet, we found no indication that rational thinkers are more literate than others.     

The Impact of COVID-19 on Share Prices in the UK*

The spread of COVID-19, and international measures to contain it, are having a major impact on economic activity in the UK. In this paper, we describe how this impact has varied across industries, using data on share prices of firms listed on the London Stock Exchange, and how well targeted government support for workers and companies is in light of this.     

Poverty analysis in the lowlands of Papua New Guinea underscores climate vulnerability and need for income flexibility*

A severe El Niño event in 2015/16 decimated an important share of Papua New Guinea's (PNG) local crop production, leaving 10 per cent of the population with significant food shortages. Lack of recent socio‐economic data and analysis of the country's rural population impeded efforts to plan and mitigate the ensuing food crisis. This paper presents the most recent poverty analysis in Papua New Guinea in nearly a decade, and a renewed effort to inform rural production, consumption and livelihood patterns in some of the country's most remote, lowland areas. We designed a rural household survey that collected detailed consumption and expenditure data to explore poverty prevalence and correlates of per capita household expenditure. Results suggest that approximately half of the sampled individuals live in households with total per capita expenditures below the poverty line. Climate shocks have significant and possibly long‐term consequences for household welfare. Households that experienced a drought in the last 5 years are associated with significantly lower per capita expenditures. Labour diversification, via migration, is associated with greater welfare. Households with at least one migrant member are associated with 13 per cent greater per capita expenditure.     

School Enrollment and Graduation Rates in Western China Based on the 2000 Census

This paper examines the 2000 Chinese Census data for educational enrollment and graduation of Western Chinese youth aged 10–18. Analysis is done on a regional, provincial, and individual level and comparisons are offered between Western and Eastern China. Comparisons are also made with the 1990 Census in order to explore changes over the decade of the 1990s. We find a substantial improvement in educational attainment rates for all groups and at all levels over the decade. School initiations are very high in every province. The aggregate gender gap has also narrowed significantly over this period. Individual level analysis shows that boys are still more likely to start school, graduate from primary school and start middle school. There is no significant gender gap when it comes to finishing middle school or starting high school.     

Introducing the concept of environmental policy integration into the discourse on sustainable tourism: a way to improve policy-making and implementation?

Many studies have explored how the tourism sector and tourism policies understand and relate to the concept of sustainable development. A common conclusion is that tourism concentrates on economic and social viability at the expense of environmental sustainable development. This paper considers if and how the concept of environmental policy integration (EPI) could improve sustainable tourism policy implementation. It defines EPI, and explores both the three-level (co-ordination, harmonization and prioritization) and four-level (inclusion, consistency, priorities and reporting) EPI approaches. It notes that there is both strong and weak EPI, and both political systems and policy analysis approaches. The paper then describes Norway's post-2007 adoption of sustainable tourism as a central part of its national tourism development strategy, with 10 defined principles, and suggested defined development standards, and assesses the implementation of the national strategy through the lens of the EPI concept. While there are now 18 pilot sustainable tourism destinations, with 44 criteria and 108 indicators, there remain many difficult issues to address. A series of suggestions are made, the chief of which is the need for a politically strong central authority that has been entrusted with having environmental concerns within the tourism sector as its key mandate.     

Resisting government rendered surveillance in a local authority

ABSTRACT

The paper illustrates and discusses how the performance management systems in a UK local authority are transformed into a surveillance system. A case study analysis reveals that the surveillance is engendered by central government and enacted by senior managers who conform to policies demanding the introduction of strict performance management systems that dehumanize work processes because employees are deemed untrustworthy. The paper shows that employees resist this government rendered surveillance because they believe it undermines their interests as well as the interests of the public by damaging the quality of the services delivered.