The selection and causal effects of work incentives on labor productivity: Evidence from a two stage randomized controlled trial in Malawi

Incentives are essential to promote labor productivity. We implemented a two-stage field experiment to measure effects of career and wage incentives on productivity through self-selection and causal effect channels. First, workers were hired with either career or wage incentives. After employment, a...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: KIM, Hyuncheol Bryant, KIM, Seonghoon, KIM, Thomas T.
Format: text
Language:English
Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2017
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Online Access:https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soe_research/2020
https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soe_research/article/3019/viewcontent/SSRN_id2944546.pdf
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Institution: Singapore Management University
Language: English
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Summary:Incentives are essential to promote labor productivity. We implemented a two-stage field experiment to measure effects of career and wage incentives on productivity through self-selection and causal effect channels. First, workers were hired with either career or wage incentives. After employment, a random half of workers with career incentives received wage incentives and a random half of workers with wage incentives received career incentives. We find that career incentives attract higher-performing workers than wage incentives but do not increase productivity for existing workers. Instead, wage incentives increase productivity for existing workers. Observable characteristics are limited in explaining the selection effect.