Two minor updates, friends: - As of 1 January 2026, I'm an Associate Professor. - As of today, the first paper I started writing on palm oil, about a decade ago, is in print in the Journal of International Economics. Read, share, cite. Open access: www.sciencedirect.com/science/arti...

For folks at the AEA meetings... Come hear us debate what we do and don't know about the impact of foreign aid.

Two views of US strikes in Nigeria... FT reporting: They killed nobody. In the wrong state. WaPo editorial: Kudos to Trump for engaging, More, please!

@justsand.bsky.social and I have updated our estimates of lives lost based on cuts to US foreign assistance spending through the end of the fiscal year. They look similar or worse than they did back in June: in the range of 500,000 to 1,000,000 people. www.cgdev.org/blog/update-...

My least popular (and most correct) view is that cars should be automatically limited to the local speed limit. Put the pedal to the floor and you still can't go over 25mph in a residential area. (15 in Manhattan btw)

New from Dev Patel, @arvind2011.bsky.social & me: "We were wrong about convergence." A few years back, we wrote a paper pointing out that Solow convergence had finally arrived. The developing world was catching up. Alas, it seems all good things come to an end. 1/

Great thread touching on why *ONLY* using private inv is NOT the solution. To echo once again the msg: focusing solely on private inv does not create much room for other riskier options (which in many EMDEs means investing in long term sustainable solutions for climate change, gender equality, etc)

TOP: Household surveys ask women age 15-49 a lot more questions. BOTTOM: So enumerators appear to drop them, non-randomly. Adjusting for this "[calls] into question whether Africa’s fertility transition is as uniquely slow as previously thought." economics.yale.edu/sites/defau...

Striking how uniquely exposed to Trump's tariffs India is: - 33% effective tariff rate (among the highest now) - 19% of exports went to US last year (not Mexico, but high-ish)

Manufacturing for export has been the major path for rapid growth in developing countries. How is the World Bank's private sector arm the IFC doing in supporting that model? Not so good.

Hello! I'm starting a new blog/newsletter thing. First post is about aid and growth, and what I think is missing from the renewed enthusiasm in DC to subsidize private investment in developing countries: i.e., export discipline. 1/

It feels weird to me for the World Bank to focus on psychological training to make Togolese people better entrepreneurs but... it does seem to work. New in the AER:

I'm constantly confused by people who see a higher poverty line as a progressive goal, as opposed to shifting focus away from the 40% of the world living on <1/10th of that amount. $100k (PPP) for a family of 4 = 99.99th percentile in India = 99th percentile in China = 93rd percentile in the world

Why aren't there more big, labor-intensive firms in poor countries? Answer here: bigger firms use more white-color workers who are in shorter supply in poorer countries.

Some news: Open Philanthropy is now Coefficient Giving! Our mission is unchanged but the new name reflects our growing work with other donors to multiply the impact of their giving. 🧵 on our work to make philanthropy a more efficient "market" and plans going forward:

Accessible to all! ...my paper in Journal of Econ Perspectives on World Bank's 1993 East Asian "Miracle" report ("Too Much A Product of Its TIme?") (www.aeaweb.org/full_issue.p...). @cgdev.org @mclem.org @arvind2011.bsky.social @justsand.bsky.social

this is a whopper - 600+ pages - but the intro by Besley and Velasco is short easy reading. Is this really the mainstream consensus? A lot of big names are in here, and other big names give positive blubs. If so, it differs from the "mainstream" econ of the popular imagination.

Book launch day -- congrats to @arvind2011.bsky.social & Devesh Kapur! The book is full of data and historical vignettes, but more importantly, really challenges a lot of received wisdom about India's development trajectory. Must read.

New @devex.com article, ft. @justsand.bsky.social, on our our $40m fund to accelerate economic growth in low- and middle-income countries, including a great explanation of hits-based vs. GiveWell-style philanthropic giving www.devex.com/news/as-aid...

Every time I talk with @mclem.org about the economics of immigration, I come away a whole lot smarter. You can enjoy the same experience: He's written a fantastic primer on what the data reveals about the effect of slashing H-1B visas. It's a banger. Read it. www.piie.com/blogs/realti...

America's offer to Africa: Trade not aid! But also, no more trade preferences.

Botswana credit rating downgraded from BBB+ to BBB, still one notch above the lowest investment grade rating of BBB-. Botswana started with a A rating in 2001 from S&P, cut to A- after the global financial crisis and to BBB+ during COVID The external shock hitting Botswana now is very specific

Tourists sun by the pool overlooking the high court next door, where Tanzania’s opposition leader — previously shot 16 times — is being tried for treason. A metaphor perhaps for the international community’s response to Tanzania’s democratic backsliding.

“For all intents and purposes, Nkrumah paralleled Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. in his reach and influence. That little is known about him outside of Africa and African diasporic communities is a reflection of the continued marginalization of the continent in the Western imagination.”

Emergency 1:30 am blog post: Trump tried to fire a Federal Reserve governor. It’s really bad, not just for the United States, but for everyone else. To start Tuesday off on a positive, cheerful note! open.substack.com/pub/someunpl...

“I have no intention of being bullied to step down from my position because of some questions raised in a tweet,” Cook said. www.bloomberg.com/news/article... Amen.

My experience is if you send Mauricio a half-baked idea, he might just code it up for you and send back a TeX file. Dunno if it’ll work with him as an editor, but worth trying at least…

School feeding program in Rwanda yields 11x return on investment academic.oup.com/jae/article-...

Lesotho was one of the biggest successes of AGOA -- which meant 'liberation day' hit particularly hard. Little early to see this in the trade data, but doesn't look great. NYT reporting factories shuttered. People going from $7/day factory jobs to $1/day hawking on the street.

@charlesjkenny.bsky.social & @justsand.bsky.social ‬focus on the impact that US foreign aid budget cuts & freezes will have on the field of public #health and find that approx 1/2 million lives will be lost each year mainly from a lack of HIV drugs & vaccinations. cepr.org/publications... #EconSky

Blog by @justsand.bsky.social and me: A Million Lives at Risk? White House proposing a two-thirds cut to global health and humanitarian funding. Using estimates of costs per life saved for US global health and humanitarian assistance suggests the cuts could lead to one million deaths.

They're terminating OPT. Today the nominee to head USCIS stated directly: he will end Optional Practical Training, the single largest channel for high-skill immigrants to work in the US. 6 weeks ago I warned about this & summarized the research on impacts of this drastic action—> @piie.com

Some personal/professional news... After 14 (!) years, this was my last week at @cgdev.org Posted a longer thread on the other site, and will share more later on what's next. For now, just want to say thank you.

The Trump admin’s FY2026 budget proposes deep cuts to US dev. & humanitarian aid, reflecting a shift in global engagement. @ecollinson.bsky.social & @justinrhurley.bsky.social highlight a key choice for Congress: endorse this retreat or pursue a more balanced approach ⬇️ bit.ly/3Z8LIRU

This is accurate. As @charlesjkenny.bsky.social of @cgdev.org has noted, the data we have support the conclusion that the reckless and illegal obliteration of USAID will cause deaths worldwide, particularly of children. —> www.marketplace.org/story/2025/0...

I think a hugely effective form of altruism at the moment is ensuring all potential legal challenges to aid cuts are fully funded and staffed with great lawyers. www.afge.org/local/l1444/...

a very interesting write-up of the world's largest poverty alleviation programme, implemented in China starting 2014. Blog version: www.voxchina.org/show-3-391.h... In contrast to other "multifaceted" anti-poverty interventions (i.e. voxdev.org/topic/social... ) it included industrial promotion

TIL Argentina gets **one-third** of all IMF loans

The illegal obliteration of USAID, an independent agency established and funded by Congress, will cause hundreds of thousands of deaths per year. That is a conservative reading of expert analysis by @charlesjkenny.bsky.social & @justsand.bsky.social of @cgdev.org —> www.cgdev.org/blog/how-man...

Was speaking with a USAID person yesterday explaining how at any other time countless phone lines wld be buzzing, working groups stood up, go-teams and aid being dispatched to after the Myanmar quake. Now ... nothing.

Make America Great Again by slashing basic health services in the Congo. Hopefully Congress doesn't take these numbers as given.

The Economist joins the call here to accelerate malaria vaccine rollout — citing our work on prioritizing R21 for both speed and cost. www.economist.com/middle-east-...

New estimates of the effects of the US Administration's obliteration of our Congressionally-mandated development assistance agency, from the brilliant @charlesjkenny.bsky.social and @justsand.bsky.social of @cgdev.org —>

New Estimates of the USAID Cuts with @justsand.bsky.social ~36% of contracts by value have been terminated, including potentially all awards in sectors including private sector competitiveness, higher education, and political competition & consensus building.

Don't give up on foreign aid just yet - despite huge cuts from many donors there's still a lot of money on the table and still broad public support. We just need to make a better case for aid effectiveness www.cgdev.org/blog/dont-gi...

Elon Musk says that no one has died because he slashed humanitarian aid. I went to South Sudan to check if that's true. It's not. Meet Peter, Achol and Evan, ages 10, 8 and 5. The reckless actions of the world's richest men are killing the world's poorest kids www.nytimes.com/interactive/...

Each dot represents 10 people whose lives depend on US foreign aid, just for HIV prevention & treatment. Without it, 1.6m people could die *per year*.

This is a loudly blown whistle.

Centre for the Study of African Economies at University of Oxford will automatically consider all applicants from Africa for full funding for the MPhil in Economics - we have new scholarships for eligible students. How? Just apply asap: deadline 4th March (extended deadline): see below

Rubio terminated 5800 USAID contracts – more than 90% of its foreign aid programs – in defiance of the courts. Here’s a list of just some of the lifesaving awards that were terminated. Nearly all were Congressionally mandated. They’ve saved millions of lives. 🧵