2023/03/29 by Nicolas Crouzet, Apoorv Gupta, Filippo Mezzanotti · 139 citations
Business, Management and Accounting · Computer Science · Engineering · #Business #Cash #Digital Platforms and Economics #Economic Growth and Development #Economics #Finance #ICT Impact and Policies #Industrial organization #Microeconomics #Monetary economics #Payment #Psychological intervention #Public economics
paper · doi:10.1086/724847
published in Journal of Political Economy 131(11), 3003-3065 (University of Chicago Press)
openalex publication_date 2023/03/29 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/31
We provide evidence on the importance of coordination frictions in technology adoption, using data from a large provider of electronic wallets during the Indian demonetization. Exploiting geographical variation in exposure to the demonetization, we show that adoption of the wallet increased persistently in response to the large but temporary cash contraction, consistent with the predictions of a technology adoption model with complementarities. Model estimates indicate that adoption would have been 45% lower without complementarities. Our results illustrate how large but temporary interventions can help overcome coordination frictions, though we caution that such interventions may also exacerbate initial differences in adoption.