5 episodes

Ranil Dissanayake and Matt Collin read and discuss topical and important papers in international development and economics, with frequent diversions into pop culture. Join us for a monthly deep dive into development wonkery and Batman jokes.

Follow Matt and Ranil on Twitter at: @aidthoughts and @scepticalranil

Paper Round Ranil Dissanayake and Matt Collin

    • Science
    • 5.0 • 3 Ratings

Ranil Dissanayake and Matt Collin read and discuss topical and important papers in international development and economics, with frequent diversions into pop culture. Join us for a monthly deep dive into development wonkery and Batman jokes.

Follow Matt and Ranil on Twitter at: @aidthoughts and @scepticalranil

    Much, much higher learning

    Much, much higher learning

    After a hiatus, Ranil and Matt return to meet IN PERSON to discuss the learning crisis in developing countries and two papers: "Large Learning Gains in Pockets of Extreme Poverty: Experimental Evidence from Guinea Bissau" and "How much can we remedy very low learning levels in rural parts of low-income countries? Impact and generalizability of a multi-pronged para-teacher intervention from a cluster- randomized trial in The Gambia"

    Transcript: 

    https://www.dropbox.com/s/yberpjwb4l3js87/transcript.pdf?dl=0

    Links to papers: 

    http://www.alexeble.com/s/Eble-et-al-JDE-2021-Gambia-RCT.pdf

    http://www.alexeble.com/s/Fazzio-Eble-et-al-JPubE-2021-Large-Learning-Gains.pdf

    Episode editing and mastering by Sam Atkinson - samatkinsonaudio@gmail.com

    • 58 min
    12 Angry Men

    12 Angry Men

    Ranil and Matt are joined by Kate Orkin from the Blavatnik School of Government in Oxford to discuss Gender and the Dynamics of Economics Seminars by Pascaline Dupas, Alicia Sasser Modestino, Muriel Niederle, Justin Wolfers, and the Seminar Dynamics Collective. They talk about econ's gender problem, its seminar culture and Loki. 

    Paper: https://web.stanford.edu/~pdupas/Gender&SeminarDynamics.pdf

    Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cx2vzwtufb1nyh4/Episode_4_12_angry_men_transcript.pdf?dl=0 

    • 57 min
    Living for the City

    Living for the City

    Matt and Ranil discuss Travis Baseler's "Hidden Income and the Perceived Returns to Migration" which investigates the degree to which urban migrants lie about their true income to their relatives back home, the degree to which this is driven by the pressures to remit money and, as a result, how people living in rural areas underestimate the returns to migration. They also argue about whether or not The Falcon and the Winter Soldier was quality Marvel content.



    Paper available here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pceRMLUgAZMS-WozO_dEa3JvHDKCZnX-/view

    Episode Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/s/u7u5c72wtno2kqx/Episode_3_Livin%20For%20the%20City%20transcript.docx?dl=0

    Theme music is "Pasikolu" by Mello C, licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

    https://freemusicarchive.org/music/mello-c/concept-beats-vol-2-deporaju/pasikolu

    Episode analytics

    • 48 min
    Wink Wink, Nudge Nudge

    Wink Wink, Nudge Nudge

    Matt and Ranil take on NUDGE THEORY. They also discuss "RCTs to Scale: Comprehensive Evidence from Two Nudge Units" by Stefano DellaVigna and Elizabeth Linos, a paper comparing the impact of nudge interventions run by academics versus those run by special units that collaborate with governments to run nudges at scale. 

    Paper available here: https://www.nber.org/papers/w27594

    Episode Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/s/cuc1qujxm2tsdrf/Episode_2_Nudge_Nudge_transcript_mix.pdf?dl=0

    Theme music is "Pasikolu" by Mello C, licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

    https://freemusicarchive.org/music/mello-c/concept-beats-vol-2-deporaju/pasikolu

    • 48 min
    It's a Poverty Trap!

    It's a Poverty Trap!

    Ranil and Matt discuss "Why Do Poor People Stay Poor?" by Clare Balboni, Oriana Bandiera, Robin Burgess, Maitreesh Ghatak and Anton Heil, a study on whether those living in extreme poverty in Rural Bangladesh are stuck in poverty because they are in an asset-based poverty trap. 

    Paper available here: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3594155

    Episode Transcript: https://www.dropbox.com/s/eo2fphckaqftjka/Episode%201%20-%20It%27s%20a%20Poverty%20Trap%21%20Transcript.pdf?dl=0

    0:00 - Introduction

    0:47 - Why we started the podcast

    Tsegue-Maryam Guebrou, “Mother’s Love”

    03:56 - Paper discussion: "Why Do Poor People Stay Poor?"

    53:20 - Other things we found interesting this week: Malawi becoming the Economist's country of the year.

    57:27 - Outro



    Theme music is "Pasikolu" by Mello C, licensed under a Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.

    https://freemusicarchive.org/music/mello-c/concept-beats-vol-2-deporaju/pasikolu

    • 58 min

Customer Reviews

5.0 out of 5
3 Ratings

3 Ratings

Policybum ,

Fun and I learned something!

Really enjoyed listening to you guys discuss the judge paper. Took me back to the great joys of grad school where papers were dissected and discussed critically. Looking forward to future episodes!

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