Data and story

Last weekend's This American Life included a great Planet Money segment about GiveDirectly, a charity that gives poor Kenyans not food or equipment or livestock or training but cash. The idea is that, whatever risks or downsides exist in just giving people money, these are outweighed by a) extremely low overhead, and b) the fact that the poor actually know best what they need.

GiveDirectly is big on data, and they're currently having independent researchers run a randomized control trial to evaluate their own effectiveness. Founder (and economist) Paul Niehaus said this:

We would like to see organizations make the case that they think they can do more good for the poor with a dollar than the poor could do for themselves. . . And I think some may be able to make a convincing case, but if you go to their websites today, I don't think you're going to see that argument being made. Nobody even bothers.