There's this fundamental question in economics that has proven really hard to answer: What's a good way to help people out of poverty? The old-school way was to fund programs that would support very particular things, like buying cows for a village, giving people business training, or building schools.
But over the past few decades, there has been a new idea: Could you help people who don't have money by ... just giving them money? We covered this question in a segment of This American Life that originally ran in 2013. Economists who studied the question found that giving people cash had positive effects on recipients' economic and psychological well-being. Maybe they bought a cow that could earn them money each week. Maybe they could replace their grass roofs with metal roofs that didn't need fixing every so often.
The success of just giving people in poverty cash has spawned a whole set of new questions that economists are now trying to answer. Like, if we do just give money, what's the best way to do that? Do you just give it all at once? Or do you dole it out over time? And it turns out... a huge new study on giving cash was just released and it's got a lot of answers.
For more:
This episode is hosted by Dave Blanchard and Amanda Aronczyk. The reporting for the first part of this episode was originally done for This American Life by Jacob Goldstein and David Kestenbaum. Our show today was produced by Emma Peaslee. It was edited by Jess Jiang, fact-checked by Sierra Juarez and engineered by Cena Loffredo. Alex Goldmark is Planet Money's executive producer.
Help support Planet Money and get bonus episodes by subscribing to Planet Money+ in Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/planetmoney.
Always free at these links: Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, the NPR app or anywhere you get podcasts.
Find more Planet Money: Facebook / Instagram / TikTok / Our weekly Newsletter.
Music: NPR Source Audio - "Race to Nowhere," "Spanish Fruit," and "Spanish Fire"
Google forges ahead with its next generation of AI technology while fending off a breakup threat
SpecialtyBelow Deck Sailing Yacht Exes Daisy Kelliher and Gary King Have Explosive Reunion in Season 5 Trailer
SpecialtyAll 4 dead aboard plane after weekend crash near runway in rural Alaska
Specialty