Mar 08, 2012

IPA/CEGA Education Event: Does More Education Empower Women

Michael Kremer from Harvard University presented in the second half of the morning on the results of a study he conducted to assess whether empowerment and political engagement increase for girls who stay in school longer.

Mar 06, 2012

IPA/CEGA Education Event: Findings on Computer-Aided Instruction

Mar 05, 2012

IPA/CEGA Education Event: Affecting Student Learning

This post summarizes findings from a group of studies in education that were presented on March 1, 2012 at a half day event hosted by Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) and the University of California’s Center for Evaluation for Global Action (CEGA). Please forgive any errors or omissions.

Feb 08, 2012

Excerpt from Interview with David McKenzie, Part I

Aug 26, 2011

A Debate on the Role of Microcredit in Supporting Women and Girls

Jul 13, 2011

Bad News for Cynics and Optimists: An Extended Interview with Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo

Whenever I read one of Banerjee’s and Duflo’s papers or talk with them I walk away with the exhilaration that only comes from (as the economist’s would say) changing my priors—in other words, I learn something and look at the world in a new way. That’s why I was so excited to spend more than an hour talking with them this spring after Poor Economics came out. We’re publishing a transcript of that extended interview in parts because it runs to over 6000 words in its entirety. 

Over the course of the interview we discuss microcredit, microenterprise funding and growth, labor markets in developing and developed countries, the evidence for focusing on women and girls with aid programs, the debate over RCTs and how they think about their own impact on changing the world.

Apr 26, 2011

Two New Books on Small Ways to Help the Poor: More Than Good Intentions and Poor Economics

Two new books from the world of development economics offer solid arguments for why all of us should care more about the small things than the big things: More Than Good Intentions, by Yale economist Dean Karlan and his co-writer Jacob Appel, and Poor Economics by MIT economists Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo.

Apr 26, 2011

Book Review: Poor Economics

Two new books from the world of development economics offer solid arguments for why all of us should care more about the small things than the big things: More than Good Intentions, by Yale economist Dean Karlan and his co-writer Jacob Appel, and Poor Economics by MIT economists Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo.

Nov 02, 2010

The Microfinance Impact and Innovation Conference Round Up

There was a huge amount of information and data presented at the recent Microfinance Impact and Innovation Conference. It was hard to take it all in, but thankfully there were a number of bloggers and other interested parties at the event who have provided summaries, interviews and reactions. Those posts are collected here for easy access and we’ll be updating the list as we go.

Oct 29, 2010

Eyes and Mouths Wide Shut?

A planned public discussion of how to evaluate the Millennium Villages Project was canceled this week for unknown reasons. Join a petition to encourage the Center for Global Development, the World Bank and the Millennium Villages Project to reschedule the discussion and make it accessible to all.