Poverty

More from the Series

Blog Post
Forests and Poverty: Barking Up the Wrong Tree?
May 08, 2017
Most discussions of the linkage between forests and poverty—including one last week at the United Nations Forum on Forests (UNFF)—focus on how to increase income to poor households from the harvest and sale of forest products. But at least as much attention should be paid to forest destr...
Blog Post
Reducing Poverty in India with the Power of Digital Payments and UBI
April 20, 2017
Demonetization is yesterday’s news. The India of today is going full steam ahead towards a digital economy powered by financial inclusion, the mobile revolution, and Aadhaar—the biometric ID system that now covers 90 percent of its 1.3 billion population. And the social compact of the fu...
Blog Post
Two Views on Fighting World Poverty
March 30, 2017
Yesterday, Lant Pritchett expressed his bewilderment at my open letter to Bill Gates advocating cash for the poor rather than chickens. I think Lant’s right and he’s wrong. We have to focus on the big picture and economic growth as a society, but I think there&rs...
Blog Post
Getting Kinky with Chickens
March 28, 2017
“Chickens versus cash” might be the “best investment” for a very narrow question, but I argue it probably isn’t in the top 100 value for money research questions in development economics.
Blog Post
Really, Global Poverty *Is* Falling. Honest.
March 23, 2017
Martin Kirk and Jason Hickel published a piece earlier this week on the annual Gates Letter. The core critique is that the letter is too rosy. In particular, Kirk and Hickel say of the Gates' letter: "some of their examples are just wrong." The case t...
WORKING PAPERS
The Impact of the Tax System and Social Expenditure on the Distribution of Income and Poverty in Latin America (Spanish) - Working Paper 450
March 21, 2017
Using standard fiscal incidence analysis and the new methodological developments by the Commitment to Equity (CEQ) Institute, this paper estimates the impact of fiscal policy on inequality and poverty in sixteen countries in Latin America around 2010.
Blog Post
Disintermediating the State: Would a 'Universal Basic Income' Reduce Poverty More Than Targeted Programs?
March 06, 2017
A UBI is an expensive way to reach the poor, but a new report from India suggests that by cutting out the bureaucratic and political middlemen, it may be cheaper than the status quo.