De Soto’s titling survey was repurposed to cut bank credit-assessment costs

Evidence

The data consisted of 2,750 households distributed across all eight cities where the titling program was introduced. The survey randomly sampled cluster units of ten households at the neighborhood level within each city. The number of clusters from each city was based on the city’s share of residents eligible to receive title. The survey did not record whether households had actually obtained title under the program (Field 2003, 15–16). This may be because the survey was carried out in response to the failure of property titling to increase the supply of credit to the poor. Its primary purpose was to promote lending by commercial banks and finance companies by collecting information that would reduce the cost of assessing the creditworthiness of potential borrowers (World Bank 2004, 12–13). — Philip Mirowski & Dieter Plehwe (eds.), The Road from Mont Pèlerin, 1994