Millions of households worldwide rely on savings groups (SGs) to satisfy their financial needs, yet important gaps remain in our understanding of this novel financial institution. We show theoretically that, within an SG, the supply of funds could fall short or be in excess of its demand. Then, we use week-by-week records from 46 Ugandan SGs to show that most groups do not generate sufficient loanable funds. We conclude by proposing three interventions that, in light of our model, should ease credit rationing and improve the welfare of SG members: requiring SG members to publicly state their savings and borrowing goals, encouraging early savings, and linking SGs with formal financial institutions.

中文翻译：

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储蓄团体的经济学

全球数以百万计的家庭依靠储蓄组 (SG) 来满足他们的财务需求，但我们对这种新型金融机构的理解仍然存在重大差距。我们从理论上表明，在 SG 内，资金供应可能不足或超过其需求。然后，我们使用来自 46 个乌干达 SG 的每周记录来表明大多数团体没有产生足够的可贷资金。最后，我们提出了三项干预措施，根据我们的模型，这些干预措施应该可以放松信贷配给并改善 SG 成员的福利：要求 SG 成员公开说明他们的储蓄和借贷目标，鼓励早期储蓄，以及将 SG 与正规金融机构联系起来。