All the papers assigned so far in Empirical Methods, grouped by the method each one teaches, with links to the explainers.
Written by DSE Study Hub editors
Written by DSE Study Hub editors
Written by DSE Study Hub editors
Interactive explainer Cohen, Jessica, and Pascaline Dupas (2010). Quarterly Journal of Economics, 125(1): 1–45
A randomised pricing experiment at Kenyan prenatal clinics: demand for insecticide-treated nets collapses as the price rises, and charging does not make people use them more.
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Interactive explainer Björkman, Martina, and Jakob Svensson (2009). Quarterly Journal of Economics, 124(2): 735–769
A randomised community-monitoring intervention in 50 Ugandan health dispensaries: report cards and community meetings raised staff effort, use of services and child health.
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Banerjee, Abhijit V., Esther Duflo, and Rachel Glennerster (2008). Journal of the European Economic Association, 6(2–3): 487–500
An incentive scheme to cut nurse absence in Udaipur worked at first, then was hollowed out by the local administration — a lesson in how implementation can undo a well-designed treatment.
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Fearon, James D., Macartan Humphreys, and Jeremy M. Weinstein (2015). American Political Science Review, 109(3): 450–469
Does a community-driven reconstruction programme make villages better at cooperating? A randomised programme in northern Liberia, measured with a public-goods game rather than a survey.
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Interactive explainer Almond, Douglas (2006). Journal of Political Economy, 114(4): 672–712
Cohorts in utero during the 1918 influenza pandemic had lower schooling, income and health decades later — the classic “fetal origins” natural experiment.
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Interactive explainer Cutler, David, and Grant Miller (2005). Demography, 42(1): 1–22
Using the staggered arrival of filtration and chlorination in major US cities, the paper attributes roughly half of the 1900–1936 mortality decline to clean water.
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Washington, Ebonya L. (2008). American Economic Review, 98(1): 311–332
Conditional on the number of children, each daughter makes a US congressperson vote more liberally on women’s issues, especially reproductive rights — the sex of a child as a natural experiment.
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Green, Donald P., Oliver Hyman-Metzger, Gaurav Sood, and Michelle A. Zee (2023). Journal of Political Economy Microeconomics, 1(3): 506–
A replication and extension of Washington (2008) across sixteen congresses: no daughter effect before the period she studied, and none after it.
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Interactive explainer Davis, Lucas W. (2008). Journal of Political Economy, 116(1): 38–81
Mexico City banned most cars from the road one weekday a week. Hourly pollution-monitor data show no improvement in air quality; the evidence points to households buying extra cars.
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Interactive explainer Somanathan, E., Rohini Somanathan, Anant Sudarshan, and Meenu Tewari (2021). Journal of Political Economy, 129(6): 1797–1827
Worker-level data from Indian factories and a national panel of plants: hot days lower output and raise absenteeism, climate control mitigates it, and annual plant output falls with temperature.
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Banerjee, Abhijit, Angus Deaton, and Esther Duflo (2004). American Economic Review (Papers & Proceedings), 94(2): 326–330
A purpose-built survey of 100 hamlets in Udaipur district: what health, health care and household wealth actually look like in one of India’s poorest areas, and how to measure them.