Esther Duflo

Esther Duflo is a French-American economist who uses randomized controlled trials to study poverty and the effects of anti-poverty programs. She shared the 2019 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences for her experimental approach to alleviating global poverty.

Abhijit Banerjee: An Indian-American economist whose research uses field experiments to study poverty and development. Duflo’s frequent collaborator and co-laureate, with whom she co-founded the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab.
Randomized controlled trial: An experiment that randomly assigns participants to treatment and control groups to estimate a causal effect. Duflo uses random assignment to compare policy interventions while limiting selection bias.
Deworming in Kenya: A set of school-based deworming interventions evaluated in western Kenya, including in randomized studies. Research by Michael Kremer and collaborators found effects that shaped Duflo’s experimental tradition.
Structural econometrics: An approach that models economic behavior and institutions to estimate parameters and simulate policy changes. It contrasts with Duflo’s emphasis on directly randomized comparisons of specific interventions.
Michael Kremer: An American economist who uses randomized evaluations to study development and public policy. His education experiments helped establish the experimental approach later developed by Duflo and her collaborators.
Field experiment: An experiment conducted in real-world settings rather than exclusively in a laboratory. Her trials test interventions amid the institutions and constraints that shape everyday behavior.
School-based malaria prevention: Programs that distribute malaria-prevention tools or treatment through schools. Duflo and collaborators studied how school delivery and pricing affect access to prevention.
Observational study: A study that analyzes outcomes without researchers assigning participants to treatment conditions. Duflo’s trials seek causal evidence that observational comparisons can struggle to establish.
Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab: A research center at MIT that promotes randomized evaluations and evidence-based policy to reduce poverty. Duflo co-founded J-PAL to coordinate field research and share evidence with policymakers.
Treatment effect: The causal change in an outcome attributable to a treatment or intervention. Estimating treatment effects is the central task of Duflo’s experimental evaluations.

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