Crowding Out Temptation: Experimental Evidence on Savings and Health Behaviors in Kenya

We dedicate this paper to Kawango Agot, our longstanding collaborator who passed away in August 2024. Dr. Agot’s intellectual contributions and commitment to this project were invaluable, spanning many stages of the project from helping to design the study and obtain funding to overseeing the study’s implementation. Dr. Agot’s insights and passion for topics at the intersection of economics and public health enriched this work profoundly. In addition, we are grateful to the research assistants who led the data collection efforts; to members of the study’s Data Safety and Monitoring Board; to the Ministry of Health in Siaya County, Kenya for permission to conduct this study; and to the many individuals who participated in and made this study possible. For helpful comments and advice on this paper, we are grateful to seminar participants at the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Cape Town, Stellenbosch University, the virtual Global Health Economics Seminar Series, the Desmond Tutu Health Foundation, and the Behavioral Science and Health Symposium hosted by the Center for Health Incentives and Behavioral Economics. Funding support was provided by the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (award number R01HD103563). The study protocol was approved by Institutional Review Boards at Maseno University and University of Pennsylvania, and was pre-registered in ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT05385484) and the AEA RCT Registry (AEARCTR-0009484). The views expressed herein are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Bureau of Economic Research.

• randomized controlled trials registry entry