Seminar by- Devesh Roy, IFPRI, New Delhi, Thursday, 1st September 2016 at 3:00 PM

An Application (or Two) of the Synthetic Control Method (SCM) in Policy Evaluation 

by

Devesh Roy
IFPRI, New Delhi

On

1st September, 2016 (Thuresday) at 3:00 PM

Venue : Seminar Room (First Floor)
Department of Economics, Delhi School of Economics

All are cordially invited

Abstract

We estimate the impact of the Hartz Reforms, the most prominent labor reforms in Germany since the Second World War, on the German labor market. We adopt a cross-country program evaluation approach where, employing Synthetic Control Method (SCM) for comparative case studies, we utilize the characteristics of OECD countries to construct a counterfactual for Germany. We find that while the reforms did not impact the overall unemployment rates they did increase temporary employment. We trace this result to elevated labor force participation with accompanying composition effect that channeled the increased number of participants to temporary employment .

We have employed SCM on issues of international trade and development. We have investigated the impact of NAFTA on regional CO2 emissions, impacts of the TRIPS agreement on the pharmaceutical industry in India – international trade, in particular. We are also studying the impact of grid separation – a novel electricity distribution policy – in Gujarat, India, on outcomes related to agriculture and leakages in distribution.