I am a research fellow at the Center for Primary Care and Public Health in Lausanne.

My research interests are in the fields of Development Economics, Political Economy and Health Economics, with a focus on empirical microeconomics questions. I study armed conflicts, interpersonal violence, and health-related questions. 

Contact: nathalie.monnet@unisante.ch

Research

Working papers

The Economic Costs of Conflict: a Production Network Approach 

with Mathieu Couttenier and Lavinia Piemontese

[Latest Version, June 2024] [CEPR Discussion Paper No DP16984, Feb. 2022] Submitted.

We develop a novel approach for estimating the economic costs of conflict, using the production network as the primary mechanism through which the disruptive effects of localized conflict spread to peaceful areas. Applying this approach to the Maoist insurgency in Eastern India from 2000 to 2009, we quantify the overall impact of conflict, taking network propagation into account. Our key finding reveals that a one percentage point increase in conflict-induced distortion is associated with an average annual decrease of 0.236% in aggregate output. Notably, 73% of the total output loss can be attributed to network propagation.  

Hit them in the Wallet! An Analysis of the Demonetization as a Counter-Insurgency Policy 

with Edoardo Chiarotti

 [Latest Version + Online Appendix] [IHEID Working Paper]

This paper investigates the causal link between the cash nature of the finances of organized armed groups and their subsequent violent activities. We use the sharp cash shortage that followed the 2016 Indian Banknote Demonetization as a natural experiment. The severity of the shortage in different districts is measured using the spatial distribution of demonetized and newly introduced notes. We construct a unique and rich dataset on daily violent events, fatalities and surrenders of the Maoist insurgents in India between 2006 and 2018. Our results suggest that there is a general reduction in violence after the policy in districts experiencing more severe cash shortage, and a positive impact on surrenders of Maoist extremists. Second, we find that the increase in the trend of surrenders is mitigated where Maoists have higher abilities to raise funds, through three traditional sources of revenue, i.e. the extortion of public work contractors, mineral and forest resources. This paper provides the first study on the importance of cash in illegal activities and an ex-post evaluation of a policy countering illicit cash flows.

Selected work in progress

The Impact of Education on Dementia? Causal Evidence from Compulsory Schooling Reforms in England 

with Mauricio Avendano, Clémence Kieny and Emma Nichols

[Draft available upon request]

What is the causal effect of schooling on old age cognition and dementia? In this paper, we contribute on this question by re-examining two British compulsory schooling reforms that yields large-scale and quasi-experimental variation in schooling. The first reform increased the minimum school leaving age from 14 to 15 in 1947. The second reform increased the minimum school leaving age by another year in 1972. We show that the additional schooling induced by the reform had close to zero impact on a range of cognitive outcomes and dementia risks.

The Impact of Digital Mental Health Technology on Mental Health, Education and Economic Outlook of Young Adults

with Mauricio Avendano, Armando N. Meier, Clémence Kieny, Martha Escobar Lux, Fabio Idrobo, Laura Torres-Cuéllar, Andrea Carolina Bello-Tocancipá, Juan Vargas-Nieto Andrea, Gustavo Adolfo Perdomo Patino, Ricardo Araya, Naomi Koerner

Poor mental health may harm the success of low-income students, but access to care is lacking. While small-scale trials suggest that digital technologies hold promise, there is no comprehensive trial assessing their causal impacts on both mental health and economic outcomes. This large-scale randomised controlled trial in Colombia studies whether and how access to digital technologies strengthens the mental health, educational attainment and labor market outlook of low-income university and vocational training students. We also study mechanisms related to decision-making, including self-control and patience. The 10-week transdiagnostic intervention, grounded in cognitive behavioral therapy, was co-designed with vulnerable young adults. Integrated in an existing nationwide program providing educational subsidies to over half a million students, this trial broadens our understanding of the impacts of digital mental health technologies at scale and offers crucial insights into how mental health shapes educational and economic outcomes.

Project website: https://unil.ch/youthwellbeing/ 

Domestic Violence and the Labor Market: Evidence from Switzerland 

[Draft available upon request]

Existing theories point to a link between domestic violence and the labor market conditions of partners in a household. This paper revisits the evidence using Switzerland as a unique laboratory, allowing for a detailed dataset on recorded criminal offenses, incomes and demographic characteristics between 2012 and 2015. Results suggest that increase in intimate partner violence is associated with lower individual wages, and when the wage of the perpetrator is decreasing relative to the victim. The latter relation only holds in a male-perpetrated violence scenario - against his female partner, and is stronger when the male perpetrator does not earn any income. Results are in line with the male backlash theory, which posits that the perpetrator uses violence as a retaliation tool to reestablish a dominant position within the relationship. Heterogenous effects arise at low levels of wealth where the bargaining effect dominates: a relative increase in the victim’s economic resources decreases his/her risk of violence in the domestic sphere.

Publication

Shutdown Policies and Worldwide Conflict 

with Nicolas Berman, Mathieu Couttenier & Rohit Ticku

[Latest Version + Online Appendix] [Covid Economics: Vetted and Real-Time Paper - CEPR Press 16, May 2020] Journal of Comparative Economics, Volume 50, Issue 1, March 2022, p. 240-255.

We provide evidence on the link between the policy response to the SARS CoV-2 pandemic and conflicts worldwide. We combine daily information on conflict events and government policy responses to limit the spread of SARS CoV-2 to study how demonstrations and violent events vary following shutdown policies. We use the staggered implementation of restriction policies across countries to identify the dynamic effects in an event study framework. Our results show that imposing a nation-wide shutdown is associated with a reduction in the number of demonstrations, which suggests that public demonstrations are hampered by the rising cost of participation. However, the reduction is short-lived, as the number of demonstrations are back to their pre-restriction levels in two months. In contrast, we observe that the purported increase in mobilization or coordination costs, following the imposition of restrictions, is not followed by a drop of violent events that involve organized armed groups. Instead, we find that the number of events, on average, increases slightly following the implementation of the restriction policies. The rise in violent events is most prominent in poorer countries, with higher levels of polarization, and in authoritarian countries. We discuss the potential channels underlying this heterogeneity.

Book Chapter

Conflict in Times of Covid-19  

with Nicolas Berman, Mathieu Couttenier & Rohit Ticku

This chapter discusses the potential impacts of the spread of COVID-19, and the restriction policies that it has triggered in many countries, on conflict incidence worldwide. Based on anecdotal evidence and recent research, we argue that imposing nation-wide shutdown policies diminishes conflict incidence on average, but that this conflict reduction may be short-lived and highly heterogeneous across countries. In particular, conflict does not appear to decline in poor, fractionalised countries. Evidence points to two potential ways in which COVID-related restriction policies may increase conflict: losses in income and magnified ethnic and religious tensions leading to scapegoating of minorities.

Miscellaneous

A Note on the Economics of Philanthropy 

with Ugo Panizza 

[Working paper] [Data] 

This note starts with a short review of the economic literature on philanthropy. Next, it provides some estimates of philanthropic giving in advanced and middle-income economies and discusses how innovative financial instruments can leverage charitable giving. The note concludes with a discussion of the controversial aspects of philanthropic activities.