Beitrag vom 19.02.2020

World Bank Group

Elite Capture of Foreign Aid

Evidence from Offshore Bank Accounts

Jørgen Juel Andersen
Niels Johannesen
Bob Rijkers

February 2020

Produced by the Research Support Team

Policy Research Working Paper 9150

Do elites capture foreign aid?

Abstract

This paper documents that aid disbursements to highly aid-dependent countries coincide with sharp increases in bank deposits in offshore financial centers known for bank secrecy and private wealth management, but not in other financial centers. The estimates are not confounded by contemporaneous shocks such as civil conflicts, natural disasters, and financial crises, and are robust to instrumenting with predetermined aid commitments. The implied leakage rate is around 7.5 percent at the sample mean and tends to increase with the ratio of aid to GDP. The findings are consistent with aid capture in the most aid-dependent countries.

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