Heterogeneous Effects of Urban Land Titling: A Replication of 'Property Rights for the Poor'. Issue 5 (4th May 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Whitney, Edward M.; Cameron, Drew B.; Winters, Paul C.
• Is Part Of: Journal of development studies. Volume 55:Issue 5(2019)
• Page Start: 1030
• Page End: 1033
• Publication Date: 2019-05-04
• Subjects: Economic development -- Periodicals; Economic history -- 1945- -- Periodicals; Developing countries -- Economic conditions -- Periodicals; Développement économique -- Périodiques; Histoire économique -- 1945- -- Périodiques; Pays en voie de développement -- Conditions économiques -- Périodiques; 338.91
• DOI: 10.1080/00220388.2018.1506576
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0022-0388

Abstract

Abstract: We replicate the analysis of Sebastian Galiani and Ernesto Shargrodsky's (GS) influential 2010 article 'Property rights for the poor: effects of land titling'. GS use a natural experiment in a poor urban area of Buenos Aires to find that land titling increases housing investment, reduces household size, and increases child education, but does not do so through increased use of credit. The original questionnaires and raw data are not available and the existing variables provided by GS allow only a limited replication analysis. Despite these limitations, we successfully reproduce the original findings published by GS, and find these results are robust to alternative specifications. We also find heterogeneous effects regarding gender and education level of the original squatter.