International financial institutions (IFIs) appear to agree that quality of policymaking sees gains from diversifying the body of policymakers, all issuing diversity, equity, and inclusion statements. But how do these institutions perform when it comes to their own staff— do they lead by example? We...

On October 30, 2023, CGD senior fellow Charles Kenny delivered remarks at the Oxford Martin School, where he is a visiting fellow. His speech, “The future of global development and implications for aid,” focused on global economic change and its impact on the development prospects of low- and middle...

There is a non-trivial chance that ODA for non-humanitarian and climate finance will fall in absolute terms over the coming years and that aid will become increasingly focused on richer countries. The most promising strategy for bilateral ODA flows may be to increase the generosity of traditional do...

Indicative projections of the evolution and peak of manufacturing in lower-income countries to 2050 suggest that cross-country income convergence will continue despite manufacturing peaking as a share of output.

On June 27, 2023, CGD senior fellow Charles Kenny submitted evidence to the UK International Development Committee inquiry on “Investment for Development: the UK’s strategy towards development finance institutions and the effectiveness of aid spending through British International Investment (BII).”

High-income countries trying to reach net-zero targets are confronting the fact that existing environmental regulations make it harder to build low-carbon infrastructure. Lobbying groups in the US, for example, are using regulatory tools to block geothermal, solar, and wind facilities. Providing sub...

We develop scenarios for the shape of the global economy in 2050 building on a simple regression of the historic relationship between current income and lagged income, demographic features, climate, and education, using the coefficients to develop a “central” forecast and error terms to set high and...