Sustainable Development Goals

One of the things I am proudest of having done in Washington was having the idea as Chief Economist of the World Bank that the Bank should devote its annual World Development Report to making the case for improving both the quantity and quality of global health investment.

Last week USAID, the world’s largest aid agency, released its Vision for Ending Extreme Poverty. That’s right, USAID (an agency not usually known for its foresight and strategic acumen) has already put forth its plan on how it intends to reorient the Agency to meet the call to end e...

There were a lot of speeches made around the SDGs by prime ministers and presidents this weekend that had a broadly similar format. The result was much stirring rhetoric, and almost nothing in the way of progress.