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A more holistic understanding of the benefits of sight-restoring cataract surgery requires a focus that goes beyond income and employment, to include a wider array of well-being measures. The objective of this study is to examine the monetary and non-monetary benefits of cataract surgery on both patients as well as their caregivers in Vietnam. Participants were randomly recruited from a Ho-Chi-Minh City Hospital. A total of 82 cataract patients and 83 caregivers participated in the survey conducted for this study. Paired t-tests, Wilcoxon Signed Rank tests, and regression analysis are used to detect any statistically significant differences in various measures of well-being for patients and caregivers before and after surgery. There are statistically significant improvements in monetary and non-monetary measures of well-being for both patients and caregivers approximately three months after undergoing cataract surgery, compared with baseline assessments collected prior to surgery. Non-monetary measures of well-being include self-assessments of overall health, mental health, hope, self-efficacy, happiness and life satisfaction. For patients, the benefits included statistically significant improvements in earnings, mobility, self-care, the ability to undertake daily activities, self-assessed health and mental health, life satisfaction, hope, and self-efficacy (p<0.01). For caregivers, attendance at work improved alongside overall health, mental health, hope, self-efficacy, happiness and life satisfaction, three months post-surgery (p<0.01). Restoring sight has positive impacts for those suffering from cataracts and their caregivers. Sometimes the benefits are almost equal in their magnitude. The study has also demonstrated that many of these impacts are non-monetary in nature. It is clear that estimates of the rate of return to restoring sight that focus only on financial gains will underestimate the true returns to society of restoring sight from cataract surgeries.

Increasingly, studies are examining whether the incidence of natural disasters influences household migration. This paper examines whether the severity of natural disasters is important for migration decisions in Vietnam, rather than just examining their occurrence. Data for a sample of 1,003 farm households from the Vietnam Household Living Standard Survey are examined for the period 2006–2008. A residual generated regressor approach is adopted to isolate the direct impact of disasters on migration from the indirect impact they have on migration through reducing agricultural output and income. Findings suggest that more severe disasters are directly associated with a greater probability of migration. Furthermore, such outcomes are the same for poor households vis-à-vis their non-poor counterparts.

Abstract Democracy and democratisation are associated with higher manufacturing wages. However, classifying a country as democratic does not highlight what institutional characteristics (if any) may be leading to higher wages within democracies. In order to shed light on this issue, this paper uses a dataset that \"decomposes\" democracy into six different governance indicators in a panel of 84 countries over the period 1996 to 2009. The evidence suggests that in poor and middle-income countries, greater voice and accountability as well as rule of law will lead to increments in manufacturing wages. It is argued that these characteristics increase wages by allowing for freedom of association and assembly as well as by encouraging greater respect for labour laws. The paper also uncovers some evidence to suggest that greater voice and accountability and rule of law can lead to a fall in wages in more developed nations. It is argued that since more developed countries are undergoing a process of deindustrialisation, more democratic wage bargaining activities will lead to faster downward adjustment of manufacturing wages. JEL Codes: J30, P48, J89, E02

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the principal determinants of women's employment in the manufacturing sector of Bangladesh using a firm-level panel data from the World Bank's \"Enterprise Survey\" for the years 2007, 2011 and 2013. The paper sheds light on the demand-side factors, mainly firm-level characteristics, which also influence this decision. The authors estimate a fractional logit model to model a dependent variable that is limited by zero from below and one from above. The results indicate that firm size, whether medium or large, and firms' export-oriented activities, have an important impact on women's employment in the manufacturing sector in Bangladesh. Moreover, the authors find that women are significantly more likely to work in unskilled-labour-intensive industries within the manufacturing sector. The research is limited to Bangladesh; however, much of the evidence presented here has implications that are relevant to policymakers in other developing countries. The study identifies factors that affect female employment, that is, where the main constraints to increase female labour force participation. The study focuses on the demand-side factors, which has been somewhat neglected in recent years. As such, it has practical policy implications. Focusing on female employment in Bangladesh also sheds light on the nexus between labour market opportunities and social change within a country that is characterised by extreme patriarchy, which has wide-reaching implications. This is an original and comprehensive paper by the authors.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the principal determinants of women’s employment in the manufacturing sector of Bangladesh using a firm-level panel data from the World Bank’s “Enterprise Survey” for the years 2007, 2011 and 2013. The paper sheds light on the demand-side factors, mainly firm-level characteristics, which also influence this decision. Design/methodology/approach – The authors estimate a fractional logit model to model a dependent variable that is limited by zero from below and one from above. Findings – The results indicate that firm size, whether medium or large, and firms’ export-oriented activities, have an important impact on women’s employment in the manufacturing sector in Bangladesh. Moreover, the authors find that women are significantly more likely to work in unskilled-labour-intensive industries within the manufacturing sector. Research limitations/implications – The research is limited to Bangladesh; however, much of the evidence presented here has implications that are relevant to policymakers in other developing countries. Practical implications – The study identifies factors that affect female employment, that is, where the main constraints to increase female labour force participation. The study focuses on the demand-side factors, which has been somewhat neglected in recent years. As such, it has practical policy implications. Social implications – Focusing on female employment in Bangladesh also sheds light on the nexus between labour market opportunities and social change within a country that is characterised by extreme patriarchy, which has wide-reaching implications. Originality/value – This is an original and comprehensive paper by the authors.

Debates on resilience to economic shocks in the ASEAN region focus on what policymakers can do to mitigate negative impacts associated with financial-economic crises. The COVID-19 pandemic has made it clear that the region is also vulnerable to health-economic crises. This study applies a difference-in-difference strategy to data from the 2003 SARS epidemic to shed light on how a global pandemic can affect labour supply and remittances in ASEAN economies. Findings suggest that even a relatively short-lived epidemic can have long-lasting effects on labour supply.

This paper provides a framework for analyzing constraints that apply specifically to women, which theory suggests may have negative impacts on child outcomes (as well as on women). We classify women's constraints into four dimensions: (i) domestic physcial and psychological abuse, (ii) low influence on household decisions, (iii) restrictions on mobility, and (iv) limited information access. Each of these constraints are in principle determined within households. We test the impact of women's constraints on child outcomes using nationally representative household Demographic and Health Survey data from India, including 53,030 mothers and 113,708 children, collected in 2015-16. Outcomes are measured as multidimensional deprivations, utilizing UNICEF's Multidimensional Overlapping Deprivation Analysis index, incorporating deficiencies in children's access to water, sanitation, housing, healthcare, nutrition, education and information. We identify causal impacts using a Lewbel specification and present an array of additional econometric strategies and robustness checks. We find that children of women who are subjected to domestic abuse, have low influence in decision making, and limited freedom of mobility are more likely to be deprived.

This paper provides a framework for analyzing constraints that apply specifically to women, which theory suggests may have negative impacts on child outcomes (as well as on women). We classify women’s constraints into four dimensions: (i) domestic physical and psychological abuse, (ii) low influence on household decisions, (iii) restrictions on mobility, and (iv) limited information access. Each of these constraints are in principle determined within households. We test the impact of women’s constraints on child outcomes using nationally representative household Demographic and Health Survey data from India, including 53,030 mothers and 113,708 children, collected in 2015-16. Outcomes are measured as multidimensional deprivations, utilizing UNICEF’s Multidimensional Overlapping Deprivation Analysis index, incorporating deficiencies in children’s access to water, sanitation, housing, healthcare, nutrition, education and information. Our preferred specification follows Lewbel, constructing internal heteroskedasticity-based instruments; and we present an array of additional econometric strategies and robustness checks. We find that children of women who are subjected to domestic abuse, have low influence in decision making, and limited freedom of mobility are more likely to be deprived. Specifically, our causal analysis uncovers a robust impact of women experiencing constraints in emotional abuse, restrictions on the use of household earnings, and freedom of movement to access health facilities, on child deprivation. We conclude that societal changes that relax constraints on women may have potential complementary benefits for their children. We recommend that analyses showing welfare gains of relaxing constraints on women account for potential additional intra-household benefits, examining other channels through which they operate.

The ‘High Performing Asian Economies’ (HPAEs) of East Asia share much in common in terms of growth rates and patterns compared with other parts of the developing world (World Bank, 1993; Balassa, 1988). However, they differed in several other respects, such as the stock of human capital and governance arrangements in support of public policy, during the early decades of sustained growth (Booth, 1999). One lesser-known contrast was the more rapid real wage growth that underpinned a labour market transition and earlier industrial upgrading among the four newly industrialized economies (NIEs) (Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and Taiwan), compared with the latecomers (the ‘second-tier NIEs’) in Southeast Asia. This remains a neglected area of research of the East Asian development experience. Analysis of these trends has wider implications for broadening our understanding of labour market dynamics associated with industrial transformation in other parts of the developing world, including in the rapidly growing Chinese and Indian economies.

Migration is a normal and common human occurrence. Moving to seek new opportunities, new lands, new freedoms, fleeing persecution or economic stagnation is a phenomenon that has shaped and continues to shape human societies across the world. Migration from rural to urban centres is certainly a feature of the modern nation-state, with economic and other shocks sometimes playing an important role in the decision to move. Household shocks are an increasingly important feature of Melanesian life. They include idiosyncratic shocks (specific to the household) such as the loss of a garden to flooding or the death or illness of a household member as well as covariate (or community wide) shocks such as large natural disasters and price hikes of commodities that households have become dependent upon