This should lead us to be sceptical about RD. Growth is arguably the major driver of human progress, but proponents of RD rarely argue that the interventions that they recommend do increase growth.
To the extent that this is true, I think there are pretty benign possible explanations:
The data on growth (e.g. GDP) and RD interventions typically operate at different scales. Even if GiveDirectly substantially increases the long-term growth in a village, that’s not going to show up in national aggregate data.
hi! have two things in response. Firstly, Randomistas are not trying to increase growth. Some of them, such as Blattman, Banerjee and Duflo are explicit about this. Secondly, for the reasons we discuss in the post, it is implausible that RCT-backed interventions are among the top 100 ways to increase growth.
To the extent that this is true, I think there are pretty benign possible explanations:
The data on growth (e.g. GDP) and RD interventions typically operate at different scales. Even if GiveDirectly substantially increases the long-term growth in a village, that’s not going to show up in national aggregate data.
Making empirical growth claims requires data accumulated over time. The randomista trend is pretty recent. Using Randomized Controlled Trials to Estimate Long-Run Impacts in Development Economics mentions that looking at long-run impacts will become more and more possible as more early RCTs reach the age of maturity.
hi! have two things in response. Firstly, Randomistas are not trying to increase growth. Some of them, such as Blattman, Banerjee and Duflo are explicit about this. Secondly, for the reasons we discuss in the post, it is implausible that RCT-backed interventions are among the top 100 ways to increase growth.