
- 05 Jan 2021
- Cold Call Podcast
Using Behavioral Science to Improve Well-Being for Social Workers
For child and family social workers, coping with the hardships of children and parents is part of the job. But that can cause a lot of stress. Is it possible for financially constrained organizations to improve social workers’ well-being using non-cash rewards, recognition, and other strategies from behavioral science? Assistant Professor Ashley Whillans describes the experience of Chief Executive Michael Sanders’ at the UK’s What Works Centre for Children’s Social Care, as he led a research program aimed at improving the morale of social workers in her case, “The What Works Centre: Using Behavioral Science to Improve Social Worker Well-being.” Open for comment; 0 Comment(s) posted.

- 14 Apr 2020
- Working Paper Summaries
Contractual Restrictions and Debt Traps
Microfinance has failed to catalyze entrepreneurship in developing countries, despite abundant evidence of high return on investment opportunities. What can account for this? This study presents a theory in which firms that borrow from an informal lender may see their growth stalled and remain in the relationship indefinitely, even though they would have continued to grow in the absence of a lender.
Targeting High Ability Entrepreneurs Using Community Information: Mechanism Design in the Field
Based on a field experiment involving 1,345 microentrepreneurs in India, this study provides insight into the depth and breadth of social knowledge contained in rural and peri-urban social networks. Harnessing community information directly from a microentrepreneur’s peers helps to identify high-growth microentrepreneurs and predict their returns to capital.