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A central feature of experimental development economics is the use of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to evaluate the effectiveness of prospective socioeconomic interventions. The use of RCTs in development economics raises a host of ethical issues which are just beginning to be explored. In this article, I address one ethical issue in particular: the routine use of the status quo as a control when designing and conducting a development RCT. Drawing on the literature on the principle of standard care in medical research ethics, as well as considerations of distributive justice in non-ideal circumstances, I argue that the practice of using the status quo as a control is ethically justifiable. However, I add an important qualification based on the natural duty of rescue to address the concern that my account is overly permissive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present article focuses on Raúl Prebisch's center and periphery framework, connecting his early, mid-career, and later work to cast a different light on one of his most enduring contributions. Using an original institutional economics approach, the article shows that Prebisch held a structuralist perspective throughout his career, but while early on he maintained a standard structuralist position, by the 1960s Prebisch embraced a less rigid version of structuralism, understanding the relationship between center and periphery through a multi-layered analysis. A movement in such direction enriches economic theory, creating a dynamic framework that views social, economic, and political transformation as a result of interactive actions (Lawson [1997]. Economics and Reality. London: Routledge) between agents and structures. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There is growing interest in how best to leverage cash transfers to foster positive impact on children in beneficiary households. We evaluate the effects of interventions based on behavioral science on measures of early childhood socio-cognitive development (and related household-level outcomes) for children from households receiving cash transfers in Madagascar using a multi-arm cluster-randomized trial, where communities were randomized into arms, with 77 communities in each arm and approximately 950 and 1200 households sampled at baseline and midline, respectively. Three behavioral interventions (a 'Mother Leaders' group, either by itself or augmented with a 'self-affirmation' or a 'plan-making' nudge) are layered onto a child-focused cash transfer program targeting the rural poor in Madagascar with children aged 0–6. Approximately 18 months into the implementation of these interventions, we find evidence that households in the behaviorally enhanced arms undertake more desirable parenting behaviors, interact more with their children, prepare more (and more diverse) meals at home, and report lower food insecurity than households that received only cash, and children in these arms perform better than children from households in the cash-only arm on several measures of socio-cognitive development including language learning and social skills. This is promising evidence that behavioral interventions can add significant value to cash transfer programs that aim to improve human development outcomes. (AEARCTR-0000957). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As cities aim for more sustainable patterns of urbanization, intensification has emerged as a core planning strategy. In 2013, the City of Regina set new intensification targets: absorb 30% of annual population growth through intensification and add 10,000 residents to the city centre by 2035. In the decade since, implementation has been unsuccessful. This study explores the barriers to core area intensification in Regina by engaging with key informants through semi‐structured interviews. Our findings identify the most significant barriers as soft market demand, a city centre that is unappealing as a residential context, insufficient political will, an absence of developers who specialize in core area intensification, and unfavourable development economics. These findings illustrate the unique challenges faced by mid‐size Canadian cites in disrupting entrenched development patterns and driving development towards the downtown. Key messages: Despite having adopted ambitious goals for intensification in 2013, Regina has been largely unsuccessful with implementation, as dispersed and decentralized development patterns have prevailed.The major impediments to intensification include soft market demand, limited appeal of residing in the city centre, insufficient political will, absence of developers who specialize in core area intensification, and unfavourable development economics.The barriers identified in this research illustrate the unique challenges and circumstances in mid‐size Canadian cities relative to their larger counterparts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this personal memoir of my lifelong collaborator and friend, Herb Gintis, I reflect on his "A Radical Analysis of Welfare Economics and Individual Development." Published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics in 1972, the article advances a novel Marx-inspired interpretation of the societal origins of preferences, one that profoundly influenced the ideas of a group of like-minded young economists at Harvard at the time, economics more broadly, and Herb and my subsequent joint work. JEL Classification: B14, B21, D01 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Polanyi, Mauss, and others describe reasons for the growing differentiation of economy from other spheres of life. This article proposes a further reason: the increasing invisibility of economic transactions in everyday life. It traces the declining visibility of economic transactions in England and North America from around 1700 to the present, as public marketplaces were displaced by growing longer‐distance trade and the growing role of intermediaries. It suggests that this declining visibility of the economic networks in which people were enmeshed encouraged the development of economic thought, ultimately including the idea of the economy as a distinct realm, which was intended to explain activities and processes that were no longer visible. That economic thought became increasingly complex and incomprehensible to ordinary people, who had to come to believe things that they did not understand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The distinction between positive economics – describing economic programmes, situations and conditions as they exist – and normative economics – prescribing policies – has a long history. It is an especially important distinction in public economics, which by its nature concerns the actions of government. In this essay, I consider how two relatively recent developments in tax economics alter, blur or at least complicate the classic distinctions between positive and normative economics. The two developments I address are the insights generated by the study of behavioural economics and increased attention to tax evasion and tax enforcement. I organise my thoughts by addressing how three sets of actors central to public finance actually behave and should behave – taxpayers, governments and tax economists. I argue that tax economics should take seriously the substantial presence of behavioural anomalies and tax evasion, and that it has already begun to do so. I suggest some directions this effort might profitably take. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Amartya Sen is often described as an insightful critic of mainstream economics, and in particular, his work in development economics, alongside the construction of the capabilities approach, has been associated with endeavors to revisit both the theory and practice of the discipline. Despite his in-depth criticisms of certain aspects of mainstream economics, Sen's extensive use of formal methods is suggestive of an ontological tension, one identified by Thorstein Veblen when commenting on some of his contemporaries and originally introducing the term "neoclassical." Veblen argued that the work of these economists involved both an implicit recognition of a causal processual social ontology he associated with modern, thoroughly evolutionary, approaches and a commitment to a taxonomic conception of science—the latter relying on a set of methods that presupposed an associationist ontology of event regularities. For Veblen, the adherence to taxonomic methods was the classical feature of their work, and the commitment to an evolutionary viewpoint was the neo aspect. This article argues that the same tension runs through Sen's contributions and that he is neoclassical in this specifically Veblenian sense. The assessment of the ontological inconsistencies in Sen's work is shown to shed light on its reception within the economics academy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper summarizes recent research in performance-based microfinance, and outlines future directions for research. We use the term 'microequity' to refer to any small-enterprise financing contract in which the repayment owed in each instalment depends positively upon the variable performance of the enterprise. We summarize research from financial economics and development economics to highlight the importance of implicit insurance in microequity contracts, and present a theoretical framework to illustrate the potential of microequity in supporting capital investment and incentivizing asset use. We conclude by highlighting directions for future research in this emerging field of microfinance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]