Poor Economics

FROM THE WINNERS OF THE 2019 NOBEL PRIZE IN ECONOMICS 'Refreshingly original, wonderfully insightful . . . an entirely new perspective' Guardian Why would a man in Morocco who doesn't have enough to eat buy a television? Why do the poorest people in India spend 7 percent of their food budget on sugar? Does having lots of children actually make you poorer? This eye-opening book overturns the myths about what it is like to live on very little, revealing the unexpected decisions that millions of people make every day. Looking at some of the most paradoxical aspects of life below the poverty line - why the poor need to borrow in order to save, why incentives that seem effective to us may not be for them, and why, despite being more risk-taking than high financiers, they start businesses but rarely grow them - Banerjee and Duflo offer a new understanding of the surprising way the world really works. Winner of the FT Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award 2011

FROM THE WINNERS OF THE 2019 NOBEL PRIZE IN ECONOMICS 'Refreshingly original, wonderfully insightful . . . an entirely new perspective' Guardian Why would a man in Morocco who doesn't have enough to eat buy a television? Why do the poorest people in India spend 7 percent of their food budget on sugar? Does having lots of children actually make you poorer? This eye-opening book overturns the myths about what it is like to live on very little, revealing the unexpected decisions that millions of people make every day. Looking at some of the most paradoxical aspects of life below the poverty line - why the poor need to borrow in order to save, why incentives that seem effective to us may not be for them, and why, despite being more risk-taking than high financiers, they start businesses but rarely grow them - Banerjee and Duflo offer a new understanding of the surprising way the world really works. Winner of the FT Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award 2011

FULLY UPDATED EDITION WITH TWO NEW CHAPTERS From the winners of the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics Why would a man in Morocco who doesn't have enough to eat buy a television? Why do the poorest people in India spend 7 percent of their food budget on sugar? Does having lots of children actually make you poorer? This eye-opening book overturns the myths about what it is like to live on very little, revealing the unexpected decisions that millions of people make every day. Looking at some of the most paradoxical aspects of life below the poverty line - why the poor need to borrow in order to save, why incentives that seem effective to us may not be for them, and why, despite being more risk-taking than high financiers, they start businesses but rarely grow them - Banerjee and Duflo offer a new understanding of the surprising way the world really works. Winner of the FT Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award 2011 'Refreshingly original, wonderfully insightful . . . an entirely new perspective' Guardian

FULLY UPDATED EDITION WITH TWO NEW CHAPTERS From the winners of the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics Why would a man in Morocco who doesn't have enough to eat buy a television? Why do the poorest people in India spend 7 percent of their food budget on sugar? Does having lots of children actually make you poorer? This eye-opening book overturns the myths about what it is like to live on very little, revealing the unexpected decisions that millions of people make every day. Looking at some of the most paradoxical aspects of life below the poverty line - why the poor need to borrow in order to save, why incentives that seem effective to us may not be for them, and why, despite being more risk-taking than high financiers, they start businesses but rarely grow them - Banerjee and Duflo offer a new understanding of the surprising way the world really works. Winner of the FT Goldman Sachs Business Book of the Year Award 2011 'Refreshingly original, wonderfully insightful . . . an entirely new perspective' Guardian

In this new edition of their classic work, the winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics upend the most common assumptions about how economics works, providing a "rich and humane" ( Financial Times ) examination of how poor people actually live Why do the poor borrow to save? Why do they miss out on free lifesaving immunizations but pay for unnecessary drugs? Why do children from poor families attend school but fail to learn anything? In Poor Economics , Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo, two Nobel Prize-winning MIT professors, answer these questions based on years of field research from around the world. Together, they investigate what the lives and choices of the poor tell us about how to fight global poverty, from why microfinance is useful without being the miracle some hoped it would be to why the poor don't want health insurance. Throughout, they reveal that even as many magic bullets of yesterday have ended up as today's failed ideas, there is a path forward through this challenge. Updated with significant new material based on insights from the last decade of research, Poor Economics is a radical and hopeful rethinking of the economics of poverty and an intimate view of the life of the poor around the world.

In this new edition of their classic work, the winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics upend the most common assumptions about how economics works, providing a "rich and humane" ( Financial Times ) examination of how poor people actually live Why do the poor borrow to save? Why do they miss out on free lifesaving immunizations but pay for unnecessary drugs? Why do children from poor families attend school but fail to learn anything? In Poor Economics , Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo, two Nobel Prize-winning MIT professors, answer these questions based on years of field research from around the world. Together, they investigate what the lives and choices of the poor tell us about how to fight global poverty, from why microfinance is useful without being the miracle some hoped it would be to why the poor don't want health insurance. Throughout, they reveal that even as many magic bullets of yesterday have ended up as today's failed ideas, there is a path forward through this challenge. Updated with significant new material based on insights from the last decade of research, Poor Economics is a radical and hopeful rethinking of the economics of poverty and an intimate view of the life of the poor around the world.