Do local labor markets influence the effectiveness of educational policies? To answer this question, we focus on Mexico's conditional cash transfer program, PROGRESA, documented to have increased attainment. We show that PROGRESA's impact schooling was smaller in areas with more export-oriented manufacturing jobs and argue is because these generate convex opportunity costs schooling. Consistent...

Conditional cash transfers (CCTs) are a popular type of social welfare program that make payments to households conditional on human capital investments in children. From targeting perspective, compared unconditional (UCTs), CCTs costly because they exclude some low-income as access is tied normal However, we argue conditionalities children’s school enrollment offer an unexplored benefit over U...

Accumulated evidence from dozens of cash transfer programmes across the world suggest that there are few interventions that can match the range of impacts and cost-effectiveness of a small, predictable monetary transfer to poor families in developing countries. These results lead many policymakers to consider cash transfer programmes the ‘gold-standard’ in anti-poverty policy with some even adv...