Can Biometric Verification Get More Cash to Poor Women? Evidence from Pakistan

• In Event: Gender and Politics in the Global South 1

Abstract

Many countries target low-income women for cash transfer programs but struggle to ensure that eligible recipients personally receive and retain control over these funds. Biometric verification systems, which require recipients to personally withdraw funds after authenticating their fingerprints, could reduce inclusion errors by reducing identity theft, unauthorized withdrawals, and capture of funds by intermediaries. However, they could increase exclusion errors by raising the time and money costs of withdrawals. We exploit the staggered rollout of biometric verification over 2017-2019 to 5.4 million recipients of Pakistan's largest cash transfer program to assess its impact on the delivery of cash to low-income women. We find that biometric verification increases women's control over how to spend cash. However, we also find an increase in reports of side payments paid involuntarily to access the cash transfer, and a decline in recipient satisfaction with the payment system. We explore mechanisms for the effects, including mobility constraints faced by female recipients and the market power of payment agents.

Authors

• Bilal Murtaza Siddiqi, University of California, Berkeley

• Kate Vyborny, Duke University