Richard Akresh

About

Richard Akresh is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Illinois Urbana Champaign. His primary research interests are in microeconomic development and labor economics, with a focus on children’s welfare issues in developing countries. He has examined the institution of child fostering in West Africa and its impact on human capital investment for the involved children. His current research explores the impact of civil conflicts on human capital and health investments for young children. Additionally, he is interested in issues related to migration, child labor, and intrahousehold bargaining.

Research topics

• Sociology
• Computer Science
• Socioeconomics
• Economic history
• Economics
• Library science

Selected publications

• War and Stature: Growing Up during the Nigerian Civil War

  American Economic Review · 2012-05-01 · 275 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding

  The Nigerian civil war of 1967-70 was precipitated by secession of the Igbo-dominated south-eastern region to create the state of Biafra. It was the first civil war in Africa, the predecessor of many. We investigate the legacies of this war four decades later. Using variation across ethnicity and cohort, we identify significant long-run impacts on human health capital. Individuals exposed to the war at all ages between birth and adolescence exhibit reduced adult stature and these impacts are lar…

  PublisherDOI

• Cash Transfers and Child Schooling: Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation of the Role of Conditionality

  World Bank, Washington, DC eBooks · 2013-01-01 · 110 citations

  bookOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The authors conduct a randomized
\n experiment in rural Burkina Faso to estimate the impact of
\n alternative cash transfer delivery mechanisms on education.
\n The two-year pilot program randomly distributed cash
\n transfers that were either conditional or unconditional.
\n Families under the conditional schemes were required to have
\n their children ages 7-15 enrolled in school and attending
\n classes regularly. There were no such requirements under the
\n un…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Evidence from a Randomized Evaluation of the Household Welfare Impacts of Conditional and Unconditional Cash Transfers Given to Mothers or Fathers

  World Bank, Washington, DC eBooks · 2016-06-01 · 107 citations

  bookOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  This study conducted a randomized control trial in rural Burkina Faso to estimate the impact of alternative cash transfer delivery mechanisms on education, health, and household welfare outcomes. The two-year pilot program randomly distributed cash transfers that were either conditional or unconditional and were given to either mothers or fathers. Conditionality was linked to older children enrolling in school and attending regularly and younger children receiving preventive health check-ups. Co…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Child Ability and Household Human Capital Investment Decisions in Burkina Faso

  Economic Development and Cultural Change · 2012-09-05 · 77 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  Using data we collected in Burkina Faso, we explore how child ability influences parents' decisions to invest in their children's human capital. We use a direct measure of child ability for all primary school-aged children, regardless of current school enrollment. We explicitly incorporate direct measures of the ability of each child's siblings (both absolute and relative measures) to show how sibling rivalry exerts an impact on the parents' decision of whether and how much to invest in their ch…

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Cash transfers and child schooling: Evidence from a randomized evaluation of the role of conditionality

  PsycEXTRA Dataset · 2013-01-01 · 56 citations

  dataset1st authorCorresponding

  The authors conduct a randomized experiment in rural Burkina Faso to estimate the impact of alternative cash transfer delivery mechanisms on education. The two-year pilot program randomly distributed cash transfers that were either conditional or unconditional. Families under the conditional schemes were required to have their children ages 7-15 enrolled in school and attending classes regularly. There were no such requirements under the unconditional programs. The results indicate that uncondit…

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Harounan Kazianga

  Oklahoma State University

  78 shared

• Damien de Walque

  World Bank

  67 shared

• Emilie Bagby

  Mathematica Policy Research

  50 shared

• Daniel Halim

  29 shared

• Marieke Kleemans

  University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

  29 shared

• Philip Verwimp

  European Institute for Advanced Studies in Management

  17 shared

• Harsha Thirumurthy

  California University of Pennsylvania

  16 shared

• Tom Bundervoet

  16 shared

Similar researchers at University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign

• Paolo Gardonih-61
• Asef Bayath-34
• Brian Allanh-29