E-governance, Accountability, and Leakage in Public Programs: Experimental Evidence from a Financial Management Reform in India
通过印度就业保障项目的实地实验和全国推广，研究发现电子发票和即时支付改革使项目支出下降24%，官员个人财富减少10%，但支付延迟增加。
Can e-governance reforms improve government policy? By making information available on a real-time basis, information technologies may reduce the theft of public funds. We analyze a large field experiment and the nationwide scale-up of a reform to India’s workfare program. Advance payments were replaced by “ just-in-time” payments, triggered by e-invoicing, making it easier to detect misreporting. Leakages went down: program expenditures dropped by 24 percent, while employment slightly increased; there were fewer fake households in the official database; and program officials’ personal wealth fell by 10 percent. However, payment delays increased. The nationwide scale-up resulted in a persistent 19 percent reduction in program expenditure.