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Field
Last Published
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Before
August 10, 2026 09:05 AM
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After
September 13, 2026 02:48 PM
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Field
Experimental Design (Public)
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Before
Households are sampled from villages in the Patna region of Bihar. A short screening module classifies each household by whether any member performs manual or daily-wage labour. Households containing such a worker receive the job-offer module described above; households without one receive a norms module only.
Within the job-offer module, three attributes are randomised by computer prior to fieldwork: the sequence in which offers are presented, which single offer becomes binding, and whether the binding offer is implemented as a real referral. Assignments are preloaded into the electronic instrument and are not visible to the enumerator or the respondent before the relevant point in the interview.
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After
Households are sampled from villages in the Patna region of Bihar. A short screening module classifies each household by whether any member performs manual or daily-wage labour. Households containing such a worker receive the job-offer module described above; households without one receive a norms module only.
Within the job-offer module, three attributes are randomised by computer prior to fieldwork: the sequence in which offers are presented, which single offer becomes binding, and whether the binding offer is implemented as a real referral. Assignments are preloaded into the electronic instrument and are not visible to the enumerator or the respondent before the relevant point in the interview.
A secondary component is conducted with respondents aged 21 and above recruited in urban neighbourhoods, to examine whether the same mechanism operates for occupations outside manual labour. Respondents evaluate hypothetical offers for office work and for app-based gig work, and the location at which the gig work would be performed is varied so that exposure to people who know the respondent differs.
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Field
Planned Number of Clusters
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Before
1,350 households, drawn from 25-30 villages. Randomisation is at the household level, so households are both the unit of randomisation and the unit of clustering.
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After
1,350 households, drawn from 25-30 villages. Randomisation is at the household level, so households are both the unit of randomisation and the unit of clustering.
Secondary gig-work component: 300 respondents recruited individually in urban neighbourhoods of Patna. The respondent is both the unit of randomisation and the unit of clustering.
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Field
Intervention (Hidden)
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Before
Each eligible worker receives the same construction-labour job in three locations that differ in extent his own village would learn what work he does: (i) his own village; (ii) a village in the adjacent panchayat; (iii) Patna city, with travel costs paid separately and daily commuting possible. Wage and task are held constant across the three offers. Offer scripts make no reference to visibility, reputation, or caste.
Each offer is posed as take-it-or-leave-it at INR 550 (the market wage). Any offer declined at INR 550 is re-posed once at INR 600, which prices the location preference in wage units. The order in which the three locations are presented is randomised. After all choices, one of the six offer–wage cells is drawn and, for one respondent in ten, implemented as a real referral. The respondent is provided with the name and referral of a construction contractor. Perceived visibility of each location is elicited after the experiment, on a 0–10 scale, so that asking about visibility cannot make it salient during the choices.
We hypothesize that Upper caste and Other Backward Caste households are more stigmatized and SC/ Extremely Backward caste households are not, and use the difference in difference of job take-up across these two caste groups and location as primary measure of stigma.
Stigma is measured before the experiment block. This includes questions on the acceptability of construction work within their caste, their own belief about stigma associated with construction through a vignette. In addition to the experimental sample, the stigma questions are also administered to households who are not eligible for experiment because they don't work in manual labor.
A final module measures worker difficulty and benefits of working in the three city. The goal of this data is to ensure that caste level difference in difference in migration is not driven by factors unrelated to stigma.
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After
Each eligible worker receives the same construction-labour job in three locations that differ in extent his own village would learn what work he does: (i) his own village; (ii) a village in the adjacent panchayat; (iii) Patna city, with travel costs paid separately and daily commuting possible. Wage and task are held constant across the three offers. Offer scripts make no reference to visibility, reputation, or caste.
Each offer is posed as take-it-or-leave-it at INR 550 (the market wage). Any offer declined at INR 550 is re-posed once at INR 600, which prices the location preference in wage units. The order in which the three locations are presented is randomised. After all choices, one of the six offer–wage cells is drawn and, for one respondent in ten, implemented as a real referral. The respondent is provided with the name and referral of a construction contractor. Perceived visibility of each location is elicited after the experiment, on a 0–10 scale, so that asking about visibility cannot make it salient during the choices.
We hypothesize that Upper caste and Other Backward Caste households are more stigmatized and SC/ Extremely Backward caste households are not, and use the difference in difference of job take-up across these two caste groups and location as primary measure of stigma.
Stigma is measured before the experiment block. This includes questions on the acceptability of construction work within their caste, their own belief about stigma associated with construction through a vignette. In addition to the experimental sample, the stigma questions are also administered to households who are not eligible for experiment because they don't work in manual labor.
A final module measures worker difficulty and benefits of working in the three city. The goal of this data is to ensure that caste level difference in difference in migration is not driven by factors unrelated to stigma.
Secondary component: Respondents aged 21 and above, recruited in urban neighbourhoods of Patna, evaluate three jobs at the same stated monthly take-home earnings: (i) a call-centre job in an office on a fixed monthly salary; (ii) a delivery-rider job on an app-based platform, performed in the respondent's own neighbourhood; (iii) the same delivery-rider job performed in the adjacent neighbourhood, where he is not known. Take-home pay is equal across the three jobs.
Each job is posed as take-it-or-leave-it at 2 monthly salary.
Stigma is measured before the offer block, separately for each occupation: the shame or hesitation the respondent would feel doing the work; whether he believes people would talk about someone who does it; whether he believes people conceal this work from others.
The office-versus-delivery comparison measures stigma attached to gig work relative to office/salaried work. Heterogeneity is examined primarily by education, and secondarily by caste category and a composite index of socioeconomic status.
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Field
Secondary Outcomes (End Points)
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Before
1) Ranked preference over the three jobs (best-liked and second-best), elicited after the choice block.
2) Reasons volunteered for accepting or declining each offer, from pre-coded lists with an open "other" field.
3) Perceived probability that the respondent's own village would learn of the work, elicited separately for each location on a 0–10 scale.
4) Perceived difficulty, non-wage benefits, and expected pay reliability for each location.
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After
1) Ranked preference over the three jobs (best-liked and second-best), elicited after the choice block.
2) Reasons volunteered for accepting or declining each offer, from pre-coded lists with an open "other" field.
3) Perceived probability that the respondent's own village would learn of the work, elicited separately for each location on a 0–10 scale.
4) Perceived difficulty, non-wage benefits, and expected pay reliability for each location.
For the secondary gig-work component:
1) offer-level take-up of each of the three hypothetical jobs.
2). Self-reported shame or hesitation associated with each occupation on a 1–10 scale, and the within-respondent difference between the two occupations.
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