Oliver Hanney

AI and development economics: Early evidence and how to keep up I have been (trying) to keep track of the latest AI-related thinking and research that is relevant to low- and middle-income countries. It is hard to know where to look and what to trust, here are the...

🆕 AI & development economics: Early evidence + how to keep up

I have updated my VoxDev blog collecting the best resources on AI relevant to development economics, organised by evidence on impacts and different use cases: voxdev.org/topic/ai-and...

AI Agents for Economic Research YouTube video by VoxDev

We are live with Aniket Panjwani on using AI agents for economic research.

The Zoom webinar has maxed out at 500?! So join us here: youtube.com/live/YPv9Bqw...

Why graduates struggle to find jobs in West Africa Educated unemployment in urban West Africa stems from educated workers rationally waiting for scarce, high-paying public and formal private jobs in labour markets characterised by severe hiring frictions. Policies that reduce private-sector hiring costs, rather than expanding public employment or subsidising self-employment, are most effective at lowering unemployment and raising welfare.

🆕 Why graduates struggle to find jobs in West Africa

Esther Mirjam Girsberger (UTS) & Romuald Méango (Department of Economics, University of Oxford) discuss how educated workers wait for scarce jobs in labour markets characterised by severe hiring frictions: https://ow.ly/ECcK50YsK0e

In 1925, hybrid corn came online in the US. It yielded ~20% more/acre, but by 1933 it was on just 0.1% of US corn acreage.

It took another drought in 1936 to move Iowa farmers, Europe didn't follow until the 50s, and global adoption is still patchy.

Could AI look the same?

The Present and Future of Industrialisation YouTube video by VoxDev

What factors are shaping current and future paths of industrialisation? Do these paths differ from the historical experiences of advanced economies?

We are live! youtube.com/live/rX2dcat...

🆕 AI, India & the future of service-led growth

This week on Ideas in Development, @deenamousa.com and I were joined by Raghuram Rajan to discuss India's growth prospects in the age of AI.

Listen to Ideas in Development wherever you get your podcasts, links below ⤵️

Eradicating malaria could deliver much larger economic gains in sub-Saharan Africa than previously believed. The new generation of malaria vaccines provides a highly cost-effective way to realise these benefits.

Read today's article to learn more:

Malaria is not just a health crisis, it is an economic crisis Eradicating malaria could deliver much larger economic gains in sub-Saharan Africa than previously believed. The new generation of malaria vaccines provides a highly cost-effective way to realise these benefits.

🆕 Malaria is not just a health crisis, it is an economic crisis

Today on VoxDev, Minki Kim (Economics department, University of Mannheim.) discusses how eradicating malaria could deliver much larger economic gains in sub-Saharan Africa than previously believed: https://ow.ly/JWuR50YrINw

Raghuram Rajan on India, AI and the future of service-led growth YouTube video by VoxDev

YouTube: www.youtube.com/watch?v=blmD...
Apple Podcasts: podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/i...
Spotify: open.spotify.com/episode/18vy...
Everywhere else: audioboom.com/posts/887132...
Substack: ideasindevelopment.substack.com/p/raghuram-r...

🆕 AI, India & the future of service-led growth

This week on Ideas in Development, @deenamousa.com and I were joined by Raghuram Rajan to discuss India's growth prospects in the age of AI.

Listen to Ideas in Development wherever you get your podcasts, links below ⤵️

How can you study an economy when official statistics don't exist, or can't be trusted?

Really enjoyed today's article which outlines six 'forensic' methods available to economists, and applies them to North Korea ⤵️

Ray of hope? The rise of solar energy in China China’s solar subsidies triggered innovation and learning-by-doing that dramatically lowered global solar costs while generating domestic economic gains large enough to outweigh the subsidy costs, sho...

🆕 Ray of hope? The rise of solar energy in China

Today on VoxDev, Ignacio Banares-Sanchez, Robin Burgess, Dávid László, Pol Simpson, John Van Reenen & Yifan Wang outline their research on China's green industrial policy: voxdev.org/topic/energy...

Technology diffusion: The role of venture capital, universities and China Josh Lerner discusses why there is a gap between innovation and impact, and how policymakers can speed up technological diffusion.

🆕 How does technology diffuse?

This week on Ideas in Development, Josh Lerner joined @deenamousa.com & I to discuss why is there a gap between innovation & impact, + the role of venture capital, universities & China in diffusion: voxdev.org/topic/techno...

Technology diffusion: The role of venture capital, universities and China Josh Lerner discusses why there is a gap between innovation and impact, and how policymakers can speed up technological diffusion.

🆕 How does technology diffuse?

This week on Ideas in Development, Josh Lerner joined @deenamousa.com & I to discuss why is there a gap between innovation & impact, + the role of venture capital, universities & China in diffusion: voxdev.org/topic/techno...

Could rural-urban climate migration help formalise the economy? Evidence from Brazil shows that drought-driven rural-urban migration reduced urban informality over a decade, contradicting conventional wisdom.

🆕 Could rural-urban climate migration help formalise the economy?

Today on VoxDev, Clément Imbert (Sciences Po) & Gabriel Ulyssea (UCL) discuss how drought-driven migration reduced urban informality in Brazil: https://ow.ly/MHCf50YnTLl

How new export opportunities created good jobs in Vietnam Bilateral trade agreements create opportunities beyond signatories. The US-Vietnam trade agreement led to large, persistent increases in formal manufacturing employment in Vietnam through the entry and expansion of multinationals from East Asia.

🆕 How new export opportunities created good jobs in Vietnam

Today on VoxDev, Brian McCaig (Wilfrid Laurier University), Nina Pavcnik (Dartmouth Economics) & Woan Foong Wong (University of Oregon) discuss the far-reaching effects of the US-Vietnam Bilateral Trade Agreement: https://ow.ly/YRZJ50Ymjw2

How did South Korea go from exporting wigs made from human hair & processed human urine (yes you read that right) to colour TVs?

Really enjoyed today's presentation by @jaedochoi.bsky.social & Michael Sposi on export-led growth.

Slides & recording available here: voxdev.org/voxdevlit/in...

Is quality upgrading in agriculture a path to poverty reduction? Under standard conditions in the Colombian coffee sector, the benefits of producing better coffee are not passed on to farmers, weakening their incentives to invest in higher-quality production. However, when a large international buyer required intermediaries to pay farmers higher prices for quality, this solved the hold-up problem, induced upgrading, and increased welfare along the supply chain.

🆕 Is quality upgrading in agriculture a path to poverty reduction?

Rocco Macchiavello (LSE), Josepa Miquel-Florensa (Toulouse School of Economics (TSE)), Nicolás de Roux (Uniandes), Eric Verhoogen (Columbia), Mario Bernasconi (University of Basel) & Patrick Farrell: https://ow.ly/Moeh50YlMhQ

🆕 Reducing air pollution: Can markets succeed where regulation fails? 📢

Today on VoxDevTalks, Michael Greenstone (@harrispolicy.bsky.social) discusses the potential of emissions trading systems in developing countries, highlighting evidence from Gujrat, India.

Link below ⤵️

One lesson that stood out across this work in India's courtrooms, classrooms & agriculture, is that the AI model itself is not necessarily the hard part.

For interventions to scale, the organisational plumbing around the model is crucial ⤵️

Three ways India is using AI for development Organisations in India are already using AI for development across its courts, classrooms and farms.

🆕 Three ways India is using AI for development

This week on Ideas in Development, I spoke with Utkarsh Saxena (Adalat AI), Claire Cullen (Youth Impact) and Niriksha Shetty (Precision Development (PxD)) about how their organisations are deploying AI in India, and what they’ve learned.

What education and minimum wages can – and can’t – do about wage inequality In Brazil, education raised productivity and reduced informality, improving outcomes for poorer workers despite limited effects on formal-sector wage gaps, while minimum wage increases compressed inequality but risked lowering formal employment for low skilled workers.

🆕 What education and minimum wages can – and can’t – do about wage inequality

Today on VoxDev, Daniel Haanwinckel (UCLA) discusses how education and minimum wages influenced inequality in Brazil: https://ow.ly/HF5C50Yk6fN

How China became the world’s factory: Trade, industrial policy, and growth China’s rise was powered by an export-led growth model reinforced by trade liberalisation, place-based and industrial policies, massive infrastructure investment, and a governance system that strongly incentivised local growth.

🆕 How China became the world’s factory: Trade, industrial policy, and growth

Today on VoxDev, Francesco Amodio (McGill University), Hanwei Huang (CityUHK), Yu-Hsiang Lei (HKUST) & Markus Poschke discuss China's export-led growth model: https://ow.ly/BcNX50YhvTJ

📢 Our new VoxDevLit on Industrial Development is out now!

Senior Editors Francesco Amodio & Markus Poschke summarise everything you need to know about industrialisation.

Read & download here: voxdev.org/voxdevlit/in...

Thinking like an economist about AI, labour markets, and AGI How do economists think about the economic impacts of AI today? And will our current economic paradigm still make sense if we reach AGI?

🆕 Thinking like an economist about AI, labour markets & AGI

This week on Ideas in Development, @akorinek.bsky.social joined @deenamousa.com & I to discuss how economists think about the economic impacts of AI today & whether AGI requires a new economic paradigm.

Mismeasuring learning: Beware of psychometric test scores High-frequency data from a large early childhood intervention in China indicates that skills develop through the emergence of qualitatively new abilities and stochastic fluctuations, rather than as higher levels of a fixed trait, challenging the practice of treating test scores as comparable measures of the same underlying ability across levels.

🆕 Mismeasuring learning: Beware of psychometric test scores

Today on VoxDev, Prof. James Heckman (Harris School of Public Policy) & Jin Zhou (CityUHK) challenge the practice of treating test scores as measures of the same underlying ability across levels: https://ow.ly/C5LN50YgXml

Qualitative interviews at scale: A new method with an application to aspirations We develop a new method to analyse open-ended qualitative interviews with large samples, and apply it to interviews with Rohingya refugees and Bangladeshi hosts on parent’s aspirations for children, revealing dimensions of aspiration that standard surveys systematically miss. For instance, despite lower formal education, Rohingya refugees exhibit higher navigational capacity than host communities, a strength that becomes visible only through open-ended methods while still allowing for statistical inference.

🆕 Qualitative interviews at scale: A new method with an application to aspirations

Today on VoxDev w/ Julian Ashwin (Maastricht University), Vijayendra Rao (World Bank), Monica Biradavolu (QualAnalytics), Aditya Chhabra, Arshia Haque (Yale), Afsana Khan & Nandini Krishnan: https://ow.ly/cBhT50YgWmy

Thinking like an economist about AI, labour markets, and AGI How do economists think about the economic impacts of AI today? And will our current economic paradigm still make sense if we reach AGI?

🆕 Thinking like an economist about AI, labour markets & AGI

This week on Ideas in Development, @akorinek.bsky.social joined @deenamousa.com & I to discuss how economists think about the economic impacts of AI today & whether AGI requires a new economic paradigm.

🆕 Special Economic Zones: Why they succeed in some countries – and fail in others

In this episode of Economics Unpacked, Tevin Tafese (@giga-hamburg.de) and Alex Rothenberg (@maxwellsu.bsky.social) discuss the economy-wide impacts of Special Economic Zones in Vietnam and Indonesia.

Link below ⤵️

Important findings from today's article

1. The scope of global humanitarian need is larger than current estimates suggest.

2. The challenges of measuring food insecurity contribute to the systematic underestimation of food insecurity.