November 2022
Article
American Economic Review

The Psychosocial Value of Employment: Evidence from a Refugee Camp

By: Reshmaan Hussam, Erin M. Kelley, Gregory Lane and Fatima Zahra

Format:Print
| Pages:31

Abstract

Employment may be important to wellbeing for reasons beyond its role as an income source. This paper presents a causal estimate of the psychosocial value of employment in refugee camps in Bangladesh. We involve 745 individuals in a field experiment with three arms: a control arm, a weekly cash arm, and an employment arm of equal value. Employment raises psychosocial wellbeing substantially more than cash alone, and 66% of the employed are willing to forego cash payments to continue working temporarily for free. Despite material poverty, those in our context both experience and recognize a non-monetary, psychosocial value to employment.

Keywords

Psychosocial Wellbeing; Employment; Refugees; Well-being

Citation

Hussam, Reshmaan, Erin M. Kelley, Gregory Lane, and Fatima Zahra. "The Psychosocial Value of Employment: Evidence from a Refugee Camp." American Economic Review 112, no. 11 (November 2022): 3694–3724.