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How Does India’s Rural Roads Program Affect the Grassroots?: Findings from a Survey in Upland Orissa
- Land Economics
- University of Wisconsin Press
- Volume 90, Number 2, May 2014
- pp. 372-394
- Article
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This paper analyzes the effects of all-weather rural roads on households’ net output prices, education, and health in a poor region of India. Cross-section and before-and-after comparisons yield these findings: (1) net output prices were 5% or more higher; (2) fewer days of schooling were lost due to bad weather, largely because teachers had fewer absences; (3) the acutely sick received timelier treatment and more frequently in a hospital than the nearest primary clinic; and (4) respondents ranked the resulting benefits in the domains of health and education at least as highly as the “commercial” ones.