In recent years, electrification has re-emerged as a key priority in low-income countries, with a particular focus on electrifying households. Yet the microeconomic literature examining the impacts of electrifying households on economic development has produced a set of conflicting results. Does household electrification lead to measurable gains in living standards or not? Focusing on grid electrification, we discuss how the divergent conclusions across the literature can be explained by differences in methods, interventions, potential for spillovers, and populations. We then use experimental data from Lee, Miguel, and Wolfram (2019) — a field experiment that connected randomly-selected households to the grid in rural Kenya — to show that impacts can vary even across individuals in neighboring villages. Specifically, we show that households that were willing to pay more for a grid electrification may gain more from electrification compared to households that would only connect for free. We conclude that access to household electrification alone is not enough to drive meaningful gains in development outcomes. Instead, future initiatives may work better if paired with complementary inputs that allow people to do more with power.

中文翻译：

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家庭电气化能否促进经济发展？

近年来，电气化已重新成为低收入国家的主要优先事项，尤其侧重于使家庭电气化。然而，微观经济学文献研究了电气化家庭对经济发展的影响，产生了一系列相互矛盾的结果。家庭电气化能否带来可衡量的生活水平提高？以电网电气化为重点，我们讨论了如何通过方法，干预措施，溢出的可能性和人口的差异来解释文献中的不同结论。然后，我们使用Lee，Miguel和Wolfram（2019）的实验数据（该实验将随机选择的家庭连接到肯尼亚农村的网格）进行实地试验，结果表明，即使相邻村庄的个体之间的影响也会有所不同。特别，我们显示，与只免费连接的家庭相比，愿意为电网电气化支付更多费用的家庭可以从电气化中获得更多收益。我们得出的结论是，仅依靠家庭电气化还不足以推动发展成果的有意义的增长。相反，如果将未来的举措与可以使人们利用权力做更多事情的补充投入配合使用，可能会更好地工作。