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...

Export agriculture and rural poverty: Evidence from Indonesian palm oil

This paper measures the impacts of Indonesia’s palm oil export expansion on district poverty and household expenditure from 2002 to 2015. Identificati…

sciencedirect.com

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-...

Update on Lives Lost from USAID Cuts

In this blog, we report on an update to our earlier estimates of the potential mortality impacts of the administration’s aid cuts. A similar approach to our original estimates using financial data to ...

cgdev.org

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)

Michael Hobbes@michaelhobbes.bsky.social · 12mo ago

There is no possible justification for limiting e-bikes to 15mph but not cars.

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)

Justin Sandefur@justsand.bsky.social · 8mo ago

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/

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.

LSE Review of Books@lsereviewofbooks.bsky.social · 10mo ago

35 years after the Washington Consensus, is a new economic paradigm emerging? Read a new interview with Irene Bucelli, Tim Besley and Andrés Velasco, editors of The London Consensus @lsepress.bsky.social @lsepublicpolicy.bsky.social

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...

New US curb on high-skill immigrant workers ignores evidence of its likely harms

President Donald Trump on Friday ordered an unprecedented new restriction on lawful immigration to the US by high-skill workers. Starting Sunday, new applications for H-1B visas required payment of an...

piie.com

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.”

Howard French@hofrench.bsky.social · 11mo ago

What a lovely, sharp and deeply engaging review by @vivienlchang.bsky.social this is! Thank you. lareviewofbooks.org/article/a-hi...

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...

Today Is Our Dependence Day

There's not going to be an independent Fed you stupid slut

open.substack.com

“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.

Fed’s Cook Says She Won’t Be Bullied Into Stepping Down

Federal Reserve Governor Lisa Cook signaled her intention to remain at the central bank in defiance of calls for her resignation by President Donald Trump over allegations of mortgage fraud.

bloomberg.com

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…

Mauricio Romero @marome1.bsky.social · 12mo ago

Some professional news: I'll be starting as a co-editor at the Journal of Development Economics. I'll do my best to be constructive, fair, and fast. Looking forward to reading what you are all up to... as I hope you are looking forward to my future referee requests #EconSky

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

School Feeding and Cognitive Performance in Rwanda

Abstract. Using unique administrative data on test scores from a high stake national exam for primary school students in Rwanda, we evaluate the impact of

academic.oup.com

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