Financial Access and Women's Role in Household Decisions: Empirical Evidence from India's National Rural Livelihoods Project

The paper argues that the loan amounts offered by most self-help groups (SHGs) may be too small to impact women, which could be an explanation for why the empirical evidence on the effectiveness of SHGs is mixed. Exploiting variation in the phasing and amount of loans provided to women members of SHGs formed under India's National Rural Livelihoods Project, the paper documents the sizable effects of larger loans on women's decision-making and on intra-household allocations. Read more