Summary Statistics of Baseline Variables and Balancing Tests.
Notes. The total sample size is 2177. The sample size of the male sample is 1562 and the sample size of the female sample is 615. All variables are from the baseline survey. The joint significant test regressing the treatment dummy on baseline covariates and then testing the estimated coefficients are all equal to zero. For regressing the treatment dummy on baseline covariates, we eliminated age 30–35 dummy, Nanghar dummy, and other langue dummy due to multi-colinearity. *** p<0.01, ** p<0.05, * p<0.1.Panel B shows the geographic distribution of the three provinces and their native language. The geographic distribution is evenly apportioned between the treatment and control groups. This panel shows that approximately 51 % of the participants have stated Dari language as their mother tongue, 46 % of them were Pashto native speakers, and 3 % were minority language speakers (i.e., Turkemni, Uzbeki, and Pashai).Panel C shows income-related information at the baseline. The results indicate that 92 % of the individuals in our study were new to business, implying that they had not started their businesses yet at the baseline. Specifically, the average income in the last month at the baseline was approximately 4,000 Afs. The P-value of the joint significant test, which is 0.412, shows that our analysis sample was balanced.
