Cojocaru, Alexandru

Person:
Cojocaru, Alexandru

Poverty and Equity Global Practice, World Bank

Author Name Variants

Cojocaru, Alexandru

Fields of Specialization

Poverty, Inequality, Subjective well-being

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Poverty and Equity Global Practice, World Bank

Last updated: November 12, 2024

Biography

Alexandru Cojocaru is a senior economist with the Poverty and Equity Global Practice at the World Bank, where his work focuses on the analysis of poverty, inequality, and social exclusion. Alexandru has worked on a number of policy areas, including poverty mapping, targeting of social assistance, and the distributional analysis of energy sector reforms. His research interests also include the analysis of socio-economic mobility, inequality of opportunity, and subjective well-being. His work has been published in academic journals such as the Journal of Comparative Economics, European Journal of Political Economy, Economics of Transition and Social Indicators Research. Alexandru holds a Ph.D. from the University of Maryland and an M.S. from Georgetown University.

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 16

Perceptions of Economic Mobility and Support for Education Reforms
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-11-12) Cojocaru, Alexandru; Lokshin, Michael; Torre, Iván
This paper investigates the relationship between the expectations of economic mobility and support for tax-financed education reforms using data from the Life in Transition Survey, which covers 39 countries in Europe, Central Asia, and the Middle East and North Africa. The analysis demonstrates that individuals who expect themselves or their children to be upwardly mobile are more likely to support tax-financed education reforms. This correlation is robust to different formulations of mobility expectations and persists over a decade, encompassing both stable and post-crisis economic environments. The relationship is partially mediated by beliefs about the fairness of economic opportunities in society and individuals’ readiness to embrace risks.
Why Did Support for Climate Policies Decline in Europe and Central Asia?
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-09-23) Cojocaru, Alexandru; Lokshin, Michael M.; Torre, Ivan
This paper investigates trends in willingness to pay higher taxes to combat climate change in countries of Eastern and Central Europe and Central Asia between 2016 and 2023. Using data from the Life in Transition Survey, it shows that despite increasing attention from policy makers, scientists, and the media, the average shares of respondents willing to pay to combat climate change declined over this period. The paper tests several hypotheses that could explain the deterioration of public readiness to support climate change policies. The most likely explanation is the growing politicization of the climate change agenda in the region.
Guidelines to Small Area Estimation for Poverty Mapping
(Washington, DC : World Bank, 2022-06-16) Corral, Paul; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Segovia, Sandra; Molina, Isabel
The eradication of poverty, which was the first of the millennium development goals (MDG) established by the United Nations and followed by the sustainable development goals (SDG), requires knowing where the poor are located. Traditionally, household surveys are considered the best source of information on the living standards of a country’s population. Data from these surveys typically provide a sufficiently accurate direct estimate of household expenditures or income and thus estimates of poverty at the national level and larger international regions. However, when one starts to disaggregate data by local areas or population subgroups, the quality of these direct estimates diminishes. Consequently, national statistical offices (NSOs) cannot provide reliable wellbeing statistical figures at a local level. For example, the module of socioeconomic conditions of the Mexican national survey of household income and expenditure (ENIGH) is designed to produce estimates of poverty and inequality at the national level and for the 32 federate entities (31 states and Mexico City) with disaggregation by rural and urban zones, every two years, but there is a mandate to produce estimates by municipality every five years, and the ENIGH alone cannot provide estimates for all municipalities with adequate precision. This makes monitoring progress toward the sustainable development goals more difficult.
COVID-19 Vaccine Hesitancy in 53 Developing Countries: Levels, Trends, and Reasons for Hesitancy
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-09) Eberwein, Julia Dayton; Edochie, Ifeanyi; Newhouse, David; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Deudibe, Gildas; Kakietek, Jakub; Kim, Yeon Soo; Montes, Jose
This paper presents new evidence on the levels and trends of vaccine hesitancy in developing countries based on harmonized high-frequency phone surveys from more than 120,000 respondents in 53 low- and middle-income countries. These countries represent a combined 30 percent of the population of low- and middle-income countries. On average across countries, one in five adults is hesitant about the COVID-19 vaccine, with the most cited reasons for hesitancy being concerns about the safety of the vaccine, followed by concerns about its efficacy. Between late 2020 and the first half of 2021, there tended to be little change in levels of hesitancy except in Iraq, Malawi, and Uzbekistan, where hesitancy increased. COVID-19 vaccine hesitancy is higher among female, young, less educated, and rural respondents, after controlling for selected observable characteristics. Country estimates of vaccine hesitancy from the high-frequency phone surveys are correlated with but lower than those from earlier studies, which often relied on less representative survey samples. The results suggest that vaccine hesitancy in developing countries, while less prevalent than previously thought, will be an important and enduring obstacle to recovery from the pandemic.
COVID-19 and Economic Inequality: Short-Term Impacts with Long-Term Consequences
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2022-01) Agrawal, Sarthak; Narayan, Ambar; Bundervoet, Tom; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Davalos, Maria; Garcia, Natalia; Montalva Talledo, Veronica; Lakner, Christoph; Ten, Andrey; Mahler, Daniel Gerszon; Yonzan, Nishant
This paper examines the short-term implications of the COVID-19 pandemic for inequality in developing countries. The analysis takes advantage of high-frequency phone survey data collected by the World Bank to assess the distributional impacts of the pandemic through the channels of job and income losses, food insecurity, and children’s education in the early days of the pandemic and subsequent period of economic recovery leading up to early 2021. It also introduces a methodology for estimating changes in income inequality due to the pandemic by combining data from phone surveys, pre-pandemic household surveys, and macroeconomic projections of sectoral growth rates. The paper finds that the pandemic had dis-equalizing impacts both across and within countries. Even under the assumption of distribution-neutral impacts within countries, the projected income losses are estimated to be higher in the bottom half of the global income distribution. Within countries, disadvantaged groups were more likely to have experienced work and income losses initially and are recovering more slowly. Inequality simulations suggest an increase in the Gini index for 29 of 34 countries in the sample, with an average increase of about 1 percent. Although these short-term impacts on inequality appear to be small, they suggest that projections of global poverty and inequality impacts of COVID-19 under the assumption of distribution-neutral changes within countries are likely to underestimate actual impacts. Finally, the paper argues that the overall inequality impacts of COVID-19 could be larger over the medium-to-long term on account of a slow and uneven recovery in many developing countries, and disparities in learning losses during pandemic-related school closures, which will likely have long-lasting effects on inequality of opportunity and social mobility.
Fair Progress?: Economic Mobility Across Generations Around the World
(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2018-05-09) Narayan, Ambar; Van der Weide, Roy; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Lakner, Christoph; Redaelli, Silvia; Mahler, Daniel Gerszon; Ramasubbaiah, Rakesh Gupta N.; Thewissen, Stefan
Fair Progress? Economic Mobility Across Generations Around the World looks at an issue that has gotten much attention in the developed world, but with, for the first time, new data and analysis covering most of the world, including developing economies. The analysis examines whether those born in poverty or in prosperity are destined to remain in the same economic circumstances into which they were born, and looks back over a half a century at whether children’s lives are better or worse than their parents’ in different parts of the world. It suggests local, national, and global actions and policies that can help break the cycle of poverty, paving the way for the next generation to realize their potential and improve their lives.
COVID-19 and Inequality: How Unequal Was the Recovery from the Initial Shock?
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2021-06) Agrawal, Sarthak; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Montalva, Veronica; Narayan, Ambar; Bundervoet, Tom; Ten, Andrey
The restrictions on mobility and economic activity that were put in place to mitigate the health impacts of the COVID-19 (coronavirus) pandemic have had an unequal impact both across and within countries, with vulnerable populations within developing countries being affected disproportionately. An important concern is that the recovery may be similarly inequitable. Across the 17 developing countries in our sample, where policies became more conducive to mobility and economic activity, we indeed observe a partial recovery of employment and incomes in most countries, as well as improvements in food security. Although job recovery and lower policy stringency were accompanied by an overall fall in the share of the food-insecure population from 13 percent to 9 percent, those living in rural areas witnessed slower declines in food insecurity. However, the recovery was not only incomplete, but also uneven within countries. In particular, the recovery in employment among those who suffered larger initial shocks - - women, non-college-educated, and urban workers - - was not sufficient to significantly reduce the initial disparities in losses. By August-September, female employment had only recovered 30 percent of what was lost between pre-pandemic and May-June (versus 49 percent for men). Finally, more recent data for a smaller number of countries up to January 2021 indicates that while food security continued improving in these countries, recovery in employment appears to have stalled, while the disparities by gender and education persisted.
Fiscal Incidence in Moldova: A Commitment to Equity Analysis
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-09) Matytsin, Mikhail; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Prohnitchi, Valeriu
This paper uses methods developed by the Commitment to Equity Institute and data from the Household Budget Survey to assess the effects of government taxation and social spending on poverty and inequality in Moldova. The paper presents the first detailed distributional analysis of the tax and expenditure sides of the fiscal system, examining in particular the contribution of different taxes and transfers to poverty and inequality reduction in Moldova, as well as the cost-effectiveness of different taxes and transfers in achieving these poverty and inequality reduction goals. The analysis finds that the tax-benefit system in Moldova is quite pro-poor and has a significant effect on poverty and inequality, with the poverty reduction effect being stronger for lower poverty thresholds. Pensions provide much of the poverty-reducing effect, which is not surprising, given that in an aging society like Moldova, pensions are the main income source for many households. Direct transfers are also quite effective in reducing poverty and are also efficient, providing a relatively high degree of poverty reduction per dollar allocated to these programs, but their overall effect on poverty is muted by their small budgetary allocations.
Poverty, Vulnerability, and Household Coping Strategies during the 2015-16 Recession in Belarus
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-09) Bornukova, Kateryna; Cojocaru, Alexandru; Matytsin, Mikhail; Shymanovich, Gleb
This paper examines the impact of the recent recession in Belarus on poverty and broader measures of household welfare and compares the recent recession episode to previous economic crises in Belarus. The paper constructs a measure of vulnerability to poverty, based on an estimated probability of falling below the national poverty threshold not exceeding 10 percent, which is estimated for each year of the household survey data between 2014 and 2017. The analysis finds that the recession of 2014-16 was qualitatively different from earlier recent crisis episodes (2008-09 and 2010-11) in that it affected low-income households to a much greater extent, and the negative welfare effects lingered. The paper also documents that although the recession did not result in a substantial increase in absolute poverty by the official definition, it led to a considerable increase in the share of households that are vulnerable to poverty. The greater degree of vulnerability is also evident from the growing share of the population that faced a risk of poverty within a year (going in and out of poverty). Household types for which the impact of the recession was most pronounced are households with multiple children, single-parent households, residents of rural areas, as well as those who were not employed, partly employed, or low-skilled employees. Coping strategies that were employed by the population were largely related to reducing expenditures and, among vulnerable households, food expenditures in particular, as well as drawing down on their savings.
Inequality of Access to Opportunities and Socioeconomic Mobility: Evidence from the Life in Transition Survey
(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2019-02) Cojocaru, Alexandru
Expectations of future socioeconomic mobility are an important determinant of cur- rent policy preferences. But how may these expectations be formed? Using Life in Transition survey data for a large set of transition economies and several Western European countries, this paper examines the link between beliefs about the importance of personal connections for getting access to opportunities, such as a good job or university education, and expectations of future socioeconomic mobility. The analysis of survey data finds evidence that: (i) lack of connections is associated with expectations of a lower position on the future social ladder; and (ii) when informal connections are unavailable, it matters for your aspirations whether you perceive connections to be vital or not. There is also some evidence that in the European Union, where formal institutions are stronger, individuals are less likely to resort to informal institutions such as personal connections, even when these are available. Perceptions of unequal access to opportunities are also linked with stronger redistributive preferences. Finally, there is some evidence that unequal access to opportunities is associated not only with lower intragenerational mobility, but also with lower intergenerational mobility.