Investing in Human Capital : What Can We Learn from the World Bank's Portfolio Data?
This paper compiles project-level data from the World Bank's lending history to describe patterns and the composition of its portfolio. The paper focuses particularly on the effect of countries' transition from International Development A...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Working Paper |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2019
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/388051548251274535/Investing-in-Human-Capital-What-Can-We-Learn-from-the-World-Banks-Portfolio-Data http://hdl.handle.net/10986/31184 |
| Summary: | This paper compiles project-level data
from the World Bank's lending history to describe
patterns and the composition of its portfolio. The paper
focuses particularly on the effect of countries'
transition from International Development Association to
International Bank for Reconstruction and Development
status, which marks the point when countries start borrowing
at near market rates, on lending for human development
sectors (education, health and social protection). Using
country and year fixed effects, which account for
unobservable country characteristics (for example, national
priorities) and time effects (for example, market interest
rates), the paper finds that human development lending
decreases when countries graduate from the International
Development Association. The average difference in the
binary indicator of lending for any sector is 27 percent
while it is 60 percent for human development sectors. The
share of human development lending (lending by human
development Global Practices over total lending) is also 6.9
percentage points (30 percent) lower. This decline in human
development lending in International Bank for Reconstruction
and Development countries is accompanied by a greater use of
budget support. The results are robust to controlling for
non-World Bank aid, as well as various alternative
specifications and estimation samples. |
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