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News, ideas, and analysis from J-PAL staff and affiliated professors. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive monthly email updates.

digital finance

J-PAL launches new Inclusive Financial Innovation Initiative in Southeast Asia

By
The digital financial services (DFS) sector is among the fastest-growing: the number of financial technology (“fintech”) companies in Indonesia more than doubled from 130 in 2017 to more than 320 in 2019. In addition to this rapid growth in the private sector, the Indonesian government is...

Saving for the future: Facilitating success for a common resolution

By
  • Samantha Carter
At the start of a new year, many people around the world set resolutions to improve their lives over the course of the year: to eat healthier food, to be kinder, and to quit smoking, to name just a few. Many resolutions are bound to fade over time—one common statistic claims that only 8 percent of...
Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo at the J-PAL Global office

From evidence to policy: Three lessons for philanthropy from this year’s Nobel Prize

This article was originally published in The Center for Effective Philanthropy. Abhijit Banerjee, Esther Duflo, and Michael Kremer recently won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics for their “experimental approach to alleviating global poverty.” But while attention has focused on their experimental...

New year, new partnerships to scale life-changing programs

In recent years, the United States Internal Revenue Service (IRS) redesigned the reminder notification letters that now reach more than 360,000 individuals eligible for the earned income tax credit (EITC), giving them millions of dollars in earned benefits. This change was in response to a...
two people looking at a computer screen

Translating research into action in 2019: J-PAL North America’s year in review

As 2019 comes to a close, we reflect back on key accomplishments, lessons learned, and the partnerships that have made it possible to advance J-PAL North America’s mission of reducing poverty in the region. From compelling new evidence and reviews of over 160 rigorous evaluations, to the Evaluation...

From technology adoption to adaptation: supporting smallholder resilience to climate change

Without adaptation—defined broadly as “preparing for and responding to the disruptive effects of climate change,” it is predicted that 500 million small farms around the world will experience severe impacts on agricultural yields, affecting their income, food security, and well-being.