Esther Duflo

Bureaucracy often stands in the way of good intentions in aid.

Health interventions must be simple and scalable to reach the poorest.

Life's greatest lessons come from the field, not the classroom.

Incentives shape everything; even the poor respond to them rationally.

Global inequality is a policy choice, not an inevitable fate.

Motherhood taught me more about resilience than any economic model.

Jokes aside, fighting poverty requires rigor, not rhetoric.

Art can illuminate the struggles of the poor better than statistics sometimes.

The wisdom of the poor is often overlooked in academic circles.

Randomization isn't random; it's a tool for causal inference.

In letters to colleagues, I always emphasize ethical experimentation.

Poverty traps are real, but escapable with the right nudges.

Politicians promise miracles; economists deliver evidence.

A witty comeback: 'If economics were easy, everyone would do it right.'

From my fieldwork: The poor save in ways we never imagined.

Life's meaning lies in making a difference, one experiment at a time.

Interviews reveal that hope is the scarcest resource.

In speeches, I say: Development is about dignity, not charity.

Humor in economics: Why did the poor cross the road? To get to the subsidy.

Key passage: 'Poor Economics shows that small changes yield big results.'