Savings in transnational households: a field experiment among migrants from El Salvador

We implemented a randomized field experiment that tested ways to stimulate migrants’ savings in their origin country. We find that migrants value opportunities to exert greater control over financial activities in their home countries. We offered U.S.-based migrants bank accounts in El Salvador, ran...

Full description

Autores:
Tipo de recurso:
Fecha de publicación:
2015
Institución:
Universidad del Rosario
Repositorio:
Repositorio EdocUR - U. Rosario
Idioma:
eng
OAI Identifier:
oai:repository.urosario.edu.co:10336/26920
Acceso en línea:
https://doi.org/10.1162/REST_a_00462
https://repository.urosario.edu.co/handle/10336/26920
Palabra clave:
Migrants
El Salvador
Rights
License
Restringido (Acceso a grupos específicos)
Description
Summary:We implemented a randomized field experiment that tested ways to stimulate migrants’ savings in their origin country. We find that migrants value opportunities to exert greater control over financial activities in their home countries. We offered U.S.-based migrants bank accounts in El Salvador, randomly varying migrant control over El Salvador–based savings by offering different accounts across treatments. Migrants offered the greatest degree of control accumulated the most savings. Impacts likely represent increases in total savings; there is no evidence that savings increases were simply reallocated from other savings mechanisms. Enhanced control over home country savings does not affect remittances sent home.