Can Property Rights Improve Access to Toilets for the Urban Poor? Evidence from India

Slums have been vulnerable to the COVID-19 outbreak. Inadequate toilets, which increased crowding and risk of exposure, has been identified as one of the reasons for this. 17% of slums in India have no access to toilets and 44% of slums rely on community or common toilets. Literature on property rights has underscored its importance for improving access to amenities for the urban poor. We find that households in slums with property rights are 4.6% more likely to have access to toilets relative to others. Further, we find that slum-dwellers with property rights were more likely to have more exclusive access to a toilet.