Esther Duflo: Social experiments to fight poverty

http://www.ted.com Alleviating poverty is more guesswork than science, and lack of data on aid's impact raises questions about how to provide it. But Clark Medal-winner Esther Duflo says it's possible to know which development efforts help and which hurt -- by testing solutions with randomized trials.

TEDTalks is a daily video podcast of the best talks and performances from the TED Conference, where the world's leading thinkers and doers give the talk of their lives in 18 minutes. Featured speakers have included Al Gore on climate change, Philippe Starck on design, Jill Bolte Taylor on observing her own stroke, Nicholas Negroponte on One Laptop per Child, Jane Goodall on chimpanzees, Bill Gates on malaria and mosquitoes, Pattie Maes on the "Sixth Sense" wearable tech, and "Lost" producer JJ Abrams on the allure of mystery. TED stands for Technology, Entertainment, Design, and TEDTalks cover these topics as well as science, business, development and the arts. Closed captions and translated subtitles in a variety of languages are now available on TED.com, at http://www.ted.com/translate. Watch a highlight reel of the Top 10 TEDTalks at http://www.ted.com/index.php/talks/top10

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Science & Technology

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• Esther
• Duflo
• TEDTalks
• TED
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• poverty
• development
• aid
• economics
• vaccines
• immunizations
• education
• deworming
• malaria
• bed
• nets
• charity

[MrStartingGun]

It is great to know that a lot of people didn't listen to or comprehend what the speaker was talking about, but are instead content to share their brilliant ideas for panaceas that will solve the world's problems. Bravo!

[fauxman]

love the accent

[ShalomYal]

@keochk The nets are not the end goal BUT it is the cheapest way to save 10's of millions of people every year!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! So lets pony up for the nets and save these people!

[crudhousefull]

This is probably the most groundbreaking TED presentation on poverty alleviation I've seen. If she also put in the idea that African governments should be involved from step one it might have been better.

[blueelectricsmoke]

it's weird to realize that field experiments with RCTs only started to become economic notions back in the 80s, and even then they didn't have much traction

[tippingpts]

My question:

Why didn't economists think of doing randomized trials earlier? Instead we had economists pretending to be mathematicians and physicists coming up with all kinds of incomprehensible equations that did not help to solve one single problem in the world.

On the contrary, many of the theories concerning free markets like the Washington Consensus ended up hurting entire countries.

And also central bankers who bail out wall street banks.

[penguino03]

24 people thought zee french acc-ent vas too strong, eh?

[KraussHelmut]

Bravo!

[keochk]

I for one don't believe bednets are a good enough prevention treatment to malaria. And medication is expensive.

[algrand90]

@Clausfarre

you say birth control and i say education education education !!

[adriluvzu]

@Clausfarre The point of Esther's presentation is that you can't go about things by simply doing them. The majority of the population in Sub-Sahara Africa believe that any form of contraceptives are a kind of witch craft. You can't simply hand them a condom and believe they're going to know how to use it and that it'll actually be a good thing. They need to know what it is and its use. Another point is that those families with multiple children have them to help out with labor. Gather your facts

[Rawrlor]

@wii2050

The Russians do the same thing. People need their stuff.