Microfinance and Women Empowerment

Contents: Preface. 1. Introduction to microfinance. 2. Women empowerment. 3. Rationales for intervention. 4. Mitigating adverse selection. 5. Competition and incentives of clients. 6. Microloans and risk. Bibliography. Index.

The viewpoint of basic economics the need for microfinance somewhat surprising one of the first lessons in introductory economics is the principle of diminishing marginal returns to capital which says that enterprises with relatively little capital should be able to earn higher returns on their investments than enterprises with a great deal of capital. Poorer enterprises should thus be able to pay banks higher interest rates than richer enterprises. Money should flow from rich depositors to poor entrepreneurs. (jacket)