TY - JOUR
T1 - Role models or individual consulting
T2 - The impact of personalizing micro-entrepreneurship training
AU - Lafortune, Jeanne
AU - Riutort, Julio
AU - Tessada, José
N1 - Funding Information:
* Lafortune: Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, JPAL, and IZA, Avenida Vicuña Mackenna 4860, Macul, Santiago, Chile (email: jlafortune@uc.cl); Riutort: Universidad Adolfo Ibáñez, Diagonal Las Torres 2640, Peñalolén, Santiago, Chile (email: julio.riutort@uai.cl); Tessada: Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, and FinanceUC, Avenida Vicun¯ a Mackenna 4860, Macul, Santiago, Chile (email: jtessada@gmail.com). We acknowledge financial support by a CAF RRC/GDN Financial Inclusion and Microfinance in Latin America grant, JPAL-LAC and Fundacion Simón de Cirene. We thank Thorsten Beck, Gustavo Bobonis, Claudia Martinez, and seminar participants at SOLE 2016, SECHI 2016, NEUDC 2016, Notre Dame, Toronto, and PUC Chile for their comments. We thank Pascuala Dominguez and Constanza Palacios for their field work, and Diego Escobar for excellent research assistance. Tessada thanks financial support from Conicyt through Proyecto Fondecyt Regular #1161621. All remaining errors are our own.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 American Economic Association.
PY - 2018/10/1
Y1 - 2018/10/1
N2 - Using a randomized experiment in Chile, we study the impact role models have in the context of a training program for micro-entrepreneurs. We show that being in a group randomly chosen to be visited by a successful alumnus of the program increases household income one year after, mostly due to increased business participation and business income. We also randomized the provision of personalized "consulting sessions" vis-à-vis group sessions, and observe similar effects on income, with the role model intervention being significantly more cost-effective and better suited for less experienced businesses.
AB - Using a randomized experiment in Chile, we study the impact role models have in the context of a training program for micro-entrepreneurs. We show that being in a group randomly chosen to be visited by a successful alumnus of the program increases household income one year after, mostly due to increased business participation and business income. We also randomized the provision of personalized "consulting sessions" vis-à-vis group sessions, and observe similar effects on income, with the role model intervention being significantly more cost-effective and better suited for less experienced businesses.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85057354196&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1257/app.20170077
DO - 10.1257/app.20170077
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85057354196
SN - 1945-7782
VL - 10
SP - 222
EP - 245
JO - American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
JF - American Economic Journal: Applied Economics
IS - 4
ER -