Re-Re-Reply to "The Impact of Microcredit on the Poor in Bangladesh : Revisiting the Evidence"
"The Impact of Microcredit on the Poor in Bangladesh: Revisiting the Evidence," by David Roodman and Jonathan Morduch (2014) (henceforth RM) is the most recent of a sequence of papers and web postings that seeks to refute the findings of the Pitt and Khandker (1998; henceforth PK) article "The Impact of Group-Based Credit on Poor Households in Bangladesh: Does the Gender of Participants Matter?" that microcredit for women had significant, favorable effects on household consumption and other outcomes. In this version of RM, the authors have backed off many of their prior claims and methods after earlier replies noted their faults (see Pitt (1999), Pitt (2011a), Pitt (2011b), and Pitt and Khandker (2012)). Nonetheless, important claims against PK remain in this new version of RM and are addressed below. Readers should refer to Pitt and Khandker (2012) for a discussion of other issues with RM, including a discussion of the bimodal likelihood.
Summary: | "The Impact of Microcredit on the
Poor in Bangladesh: Revisiting the Evidence," by David
Roodman and Jonathan Morduch (2014) (henceforth RM) is the
most recent of a sequence of papers and web postings that
seeks to refute the findings of the Pitt and Khandker (1998;
henceforth PK) article "The Impact of Group-Based
Credit on Poor Households in Bangladesh: Does the Gender of
Participants Matter?" that microcredit for women had
significant, favorable effects on household consumption and
other outcomes. In this version of RM, the authors have
backed off many of their prior claims and methods after
earlier replies noted their faults (see Pitt (1999), Pitt
(2011a), Pitt (2011b), and Pitt and Khandker (2012)).
Nonetheless, important claims against PK remain in this new
version of RM and are addressed below. Readers should refer
to Pitt and Khandker (2012) for a discussion of other issues
with RM, including a discussion of the bimodal likelihood. |
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