When the total is more than the sum of parts : infrastructure complementarities

This paper shows evidence on complementarities in infrastructure and the magnitude of their impacts on social indicators over Peruvian households (level of income, expenditures and capacity of savings). In order to test the hypothesis, it evaluates the impact of having access to each of the basic services on variables that reflect the living conditions of Peruvian households. The dataset consists of information obtained from the National Household Survey (ENAHO) for 2006 and 2013, with the aim of comparing the effects between beneficiaries of infrastructure and non-beneficiaries, and using as methodologies the Propensity Score Matching and Double-Differences. The infrastructure variables obtained from ENAHO are household access to water, sanitation, electricity and telecommunications. The results demonstrate positive effects on infrastructure complementarities for Peruvian households, in the sense that benefits of having more utilities together (2, 3 or 4) are greater than summing up individual benefits of each utility.