Poor Economics

makes the world a more interesting place.

Verifiable evidence is a chimera, at best a distant fantasy, at worst a distraction.

it is possible to make very significant progress against the biggest problem in the world through the accumulation of a set of small steps, each well thought out, carefully tested, and judiciously implemented.

Moyo tells the story of how a bed-net supplier was ruined by a free bed-net distribution program. When free distribution stopped, there was no one to supply bed nets at any price.

To shed light on this debate, we need to answer three questions. First, if people must pay full price (or at least a significant fraction of the price) for a bed net, will they prefer to go without? Second, if bed nets are given to them free or at some subsidized price, will people use them, or will they be wasted? Third, after getting the net at subsidized price once, will they become more or less willing to pay for the next one if the subsidies are reduced in the future?

philosopher Peter Singer has written about the moral imperative to save the lives of those we don’t know.

can kick-start a virtuous cycle by helping poor countries invest in these critical areas

Success isn’t always as far away as it looks.

All this implies that making the most of their talent and securing their family’s future take that much more skill, willpower, and commitment for the poor.

This book comes out of that interchange; it represents our attempt to knit together a coherent story of how poor people live their lives.