tailieunhanh - TYING ODYSSEUS TO THE MAST: EVIDENCE FROM A COMMITMENT SAVINGS PRODUCT IN THE PHILIPPINES*

Since the 1980s, the Bank has made progress in integrating gen- der issues into country work and lending, particularly in education and health. For example, between 1995 and 2000 the Bank lent more than $ billion for girls’ education programs, and was also the single largest lender in the world for health, nutrition, and pop- ulation projects, three-quarters of which contained gender-respon- sive actions. Attention to gender issues in World Bank Country Assistance Strategies (CASs) also increased during this period. Sever- al organizational changes designed to facilitate greater attention to gender and development issues were also made, including issuing an Operational Policy on the gender dimension of development in 1994, and. | TYING ODYSSEUS TO THE MAST EVIDENCE FROM A COMMITMENT SAVINGS PRODUCT IN THE PHILIPPINES Nava Ashraf Dean Karlan Wesley Yin We designed a commitment savings product for a Philippine bank and implemented it using a randomized control methodology. The savings product was intended for individuals who want to commit now to restrict access to their savings and who were sophisticated enough to engage in such a mechanism. We conducted a baseline survey on 1777 existing or former clients of a bank. One month later we offered the commitment product to a randomly chosen subset of 710 clients 202 percent accepted the offer and opened the account. In the baseline survey we asked hypothetical time discounting questions. Women who exhibited a lower discount rate for future relative to current trade-offs and hence potentially have a preference for commitment were indeed significantly more likely to open the commitment savings account. After twelve months average savings balances increased by 81 percentage points for those clients assigned to the treatment group relative to those assigned to the control group. We conclude that the savings response represents a lasting change in savings and not merely a short-term response to a new product. I. Introduction Although much has been written little has been resolved concerning the representation of preferences for consumption over time. Beginning with Strotz 1955 and Phelps and Pollak 1968 models have been put forth that predict individuals will exhibit more impatience for near-term trade-offs than for future trade-offs. These models often incorporate hyperbolic or quasi- We thank Chona Echavez for collaborating on the field work the Green Bank of Caraga for cooperation throughout this experiment John Owens and the USAID Philippines Microenterprise Access to Banking Services Program team for helping to get the project started Nathalie Gons Tomoko Harigaya Karen Lyons and Lauren Smith for excellent research and field assistance and

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