Employability of the Poor

While the number of people living in extreme poverty, defined as persons living on less than $1.25 per day, has declined over the last decades, estimates of global poverty remain high in the 21st century. In order to lift people out of poverty, employment is crucial. The World Bank asked RAND Europe to conduct a stocktaking exercise to map the diversity of employment interventions in South Asia and to review evidence of the impact of interventions. The stocktaking exercise aimed to map the most prominent employment interventions in a number of countries suggested by the World Bank: Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The second step involved an assessment of the impact of such interventions to understand if they are effective vehicles to increase employment. The evidence of the impact of interventions has been assessed through a meta-regression based on a scoping of academic literature.