The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) is a global research center working to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence. Anchored by a network of more than 1,000 researchers at universities around the world, J-PAL conducts randomized impact evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty.
The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL) is a global research center working to reduce poverty by ensuring that policy is informed by scientific evidence. Anchored by a network of more than 1,000 researchers at universities around the world, J-PAL conducts randomized impact evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty.
Our affiliated professors are based at over 120 universities and conduct randomized evaluations around the world to design, evaluate, and improve programs and policies aimed at reducing poverty. They set their own research agendas, raise funds to support their evaluations, and work with J-PAL staff on research, policy outreach, and training.
Our Board of Directors, which is composed of J-PAL affiliated professors and senior management, provides overall strategic guidance to J-PAL, our sector programs, and regional offices.
J-PAL recognizes that there is a lack of diversity, equity, and inclusion in the field of economics and in our field of work. Read about what actions we are taking to address this.
We host events around the world and online to share results and policy lessons from randomized evaluations, to build new partnerships between researchers and practitioners, and to train organizations on how to design and conduct randomized evaluations, and use evidence from impact evaluations.
Browse news articles about J-PAL and our affiliated professors, read our press releases and monthly global and research newsletters, and connect with us for media inquiries.
Based at leading universities around the world, our experts are economists who use randomized evaluations to answer critical questions in the fight against poverty. Connect with us for all media inquiries and we'll help you find the right person to shed insight on your story.
J-PAL is based at MIT in Cambridge, MA and has seven regional offices at leading universities in Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Middle East and North Africa, North America, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.
J-PAL is based at MIT in Cambridge, MA and has seven regional offices at leading universities in Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Middle East and North Africa, North America, South Asia, and Southeast Asia.
Our global office is based at the Department of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It serves as the head office for our network of seven independent regional offices.
Led by affiliated professors, J-PAL sectors guide our research and policy work by conducting literature reviews; by managing research initiatives that promote the rigorous evaluation of innovative interventions by affiliates; and by summarizing findings and lessons from randomized evaluations and producing cost-effectiveness analyses to help inform relevant policy debates.
Led by affiliated professors, J-PAL sectors guide our research and policy work by conducting literature reviews; by managing research initiatives that promote the rigorous evaluation of innovative interventions by affiliates; and by summarizing findings and lessons from randomized evaluations and producing cost-effectiveness analyses to help inform relevant policy debates.
How do policies affecting private sector firms impact productivity gaps between higher-income and lower-income countries? How do firms’ own policies impact economic growth and worker welfare?
How can we identify effective policies and programs in low- and middle-income countries that provide financial assistance to low-income families, insuring against shocks and breaking poverty traps?
Children born into poverty lag behind higher-income peers in school and earn substantially less as adults. Comprehensive case management programs have emerged as a promising support for low-income parents and their children (Evans et al., 2023; Engle et al...
We study the impacts of a major “demand-driven” workforce development program for under- and unemployed job seekers in Chicago. The program, run by Skills for Chicagoland's Future, works with employers to understand their hiring needs, company culture, and...
Districts across the United States are increasingly adopting tutoring as an evidence-based strategy for supporting students. Our study will test the impact of providing math tutoring on students at risk of not meeting early benchmarks. We will study a novel...
The Housing Solutions Lab at NYU Furman Center seeks to provide technical assistance, peer learning opportunities, and research and evaluation support to a set of 4-5 public housing authorities (PHAs) with the aim of developing rigorous direct rental...
Parental engagement in a child’s learning is a key for academic success; however, especially for low-income families, there are several barriers to its frequency and effectiveness. We propose a randomized control trial study of an intervention called Math...
The consumer bankruptcy system provides significant benefits to high-debt individuals, yet fewer than 1% of US adults file each year. We will run a randomized control trial to estimate the extent to which a lack of information about (1) asset exemptions and...
Family Promise of West Michigan, Family Promise of Spokane, and the Lord’s Place, located in West Palm Beach, are three nonprofit organizations dedicated to fighting homelessness in their local communities. As part of this mission, these organizations...
Efforts to portray minority groups positively often prompts a backlash in the majority group. In this project, I seek to answer: (1) Are majority group members averse to these positive depictions or the processes that create them? (2) What are the...
This study will evaluate intensive financial assistance to prevent homelessness. The Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) and Mary’s Place, the largest provider of emergency shelter to families in Seattle, will assess a new homelessness...
Community colleges enroll nearly half of all new degree-seeking students, as well as a disproportionate share of students with low income, who identify as members of racial or ethnic minority groups, or who would be the first in their families to complete...
While congregate shelters remain the predominant form of interim housing available for single adults experiencing homelessness, several public and private service providers in California are experimenting with an interim housing model: tiny home communities...
Tutoring is one of the most effective policies for improving education but is often impractical because of scalability and cost constraints. One solution is to teach teachers to use more effectively Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) for simulating the tutoring...
Harris County leads the nation in evictions – which disproportionately affect households of color and, some evidence suggests, negatively influence health, education, and generational wealth. Harris County’s statistics do not include “informal evictions,”...
Tutoring stands out as a highly effective educational policy for improving student outcomes, but its implementation is hindered by issues of scalability and cost. One solution involves equipping teachers with enhanced skills in utilizing Computer Assisted...
Black Americans experience substantially different economic circumstances compared to their white peers. Black households earn incomes that are 58 cents on the dollar compared to white households, and the median net worth of white households is nearly 8 times...
The main appeal of unconditional cash transfers as a poverty alleviation tool is that transfers give beneficiaries the freedom to invest in areas of their life where they expect the benefits to be greatest, which could include categories ranging from housing...
The Wilson Sheehan Lab for Economic Opportunities (LEO) has partnered with Thread of Baltimore, Maryland to evaluate their high school mentorship program, an intervention designed to assist underperforming students at risk of dropping out of school. Students...
Individuals who earn degrees in STEM fields have better labor market outcomes on average. For some, a STEM education can be a pathway out of poverty, however; minoritized populations in the U.S. are less likely to earn degrees in STEM fields. In this project...
Peer tutoring has a potential “double-dividend”: the tutors themselves may be learning from the process. I will pilot a new intervention, Learning by Creating Math Tutoring Videos (LCMTV), which aims to help middle and high school students learn math by...
Recent events of police brutality have sparked policy demands to “reduce the scope of policing in our society.” However, the details of these demands are challenging to assess because of a lack of data and limited understanding about them. This project employs...
More than half a million prisoners are released from state and federal prisons each year. Formerly incarcerated people are nearly ten times more likely to experience homelessness than the general population, and the risk is highest in the first two years after...
Parental engagement in a child’s learning is a key for academic success; however, especially for low-income families, there are several barriers to its frequency and effectiveness. We propose a small-scale randomized control trial (RCT) pilot of a new...
Community colleges have the potential to be powerful vehicles for economic mobility. However, the majority of students who enroll in community colleges do not earn a degree within three years. A growing research literature, including an RCT conducted by the...
Research questions: Can outreach to people with criminal records – a hard-to-find group based on traditional data sources – increase registration and voting behavior for this group? Is outreach to people in their social networks equally or more effective...
Districts across the United States are increasingly adopting tutoring as a strategy to support their struggling students, the majority of whom come from low-income families and marginalized backgrounds. Our pilot will explore whether providing tutors with a...
Completing high school and transitioning to post-secondary schooling or the workforce are critical steps to economic well-being in the United States. While high school graduation rates have increased, differential completion rates persist across school...
This project focuses on workers’ perceptions of discrimination, specifically (1) providing evidence on the effectiveness of hiring and promotion mechanisms that could reduce perceptions of discrimination; (2) how perceived discrimination affects job...
We will conduct a RCT called Evaluating Learning Interactions (ELI) to examine the efficacy of two contrasting approaches to help low-income parents improve the school readiness skills of their 3-5 year-old children. ELI is a six-month text-based program...
Public health measures instituted in response to the novel coronavirus have resulted in unprecedented increases in unemployment. This mass unemployment will leave many already rent-burdened Chicagoans unable to pay for housing. While the closure of eviction...
Nearly a half century after the civil rights movement, racial inequity remains a defining feature of U.S. society. We formalize a model of structural racism and empirically test a central implication – that beliefs regarding racial discrimination in one system...
In response to Covid-related complications, we request funding that will enable us to postpone for 12 months the collection of our capstone lab-based measurements of child functioning in the Baby’s First Years (BFY) RCT. BFY has randomly assigned 1,000 low...
Racial disparities exist at every stage of the U.S. criminal justice system and are particularly prominent in the setting of bail. These racial disparities in bail are even larger for the sizeable youth population. In settings like Harris County, TX, a site in...
Randomized controlled trials (RCTs) have been influential in shaping policy to address the stark racial and income disparities in criminal justice involvement. Yet crime-prevention experiments typically ignore the possibility of peer spillovers, which could...
Differences in academic achievement between high and low socioeconomic status (SES) children arise at a very early age. Understanding the factors that give rise to these differences is essential for understanding the intergenerational transmission of poverty...
Failure to appear (FTA) in a criminal court case is costly for both the State and the defendant. Research shows defendants miss their court hearings for numerous reasons other than an intent to avoid prosecution. While several studies have shown success in...
This study seeks to better understand the role of individualized, virtual summer instruction in redressing learning losses resulting from the COVID-19 school closures. In particular, we are interested in the potential for virtual learning to combat the...
The California Policy Lab at UC Berkeley is conducting an evaluation of the Santa Clara Public Defender’s Office Pre-Arraignment Representation and Review (PARR) Project, which provides early legal representation to low-income felony defendants. Normally...
Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) is educational software designed to help students progress through material at their own pace while receiving feedback and advice, similar to the kind that a tutor might provide but on a computer. CAL also makes it easier for...
We propose a pilot of a new intervention, Parent Engagement and Action for Kindergarten Success (PEAKS), which aims to improve the school readiness of low-income children not enrolled in preschool. PEAKS will use behavioral tools designed to increase parent...
Direct, unconditional cash transfers have been proposed as a poverty alleviation policy in the United States. Yet to fully evaluate cash transfer policies, researchers need an understanding of what beneficiaries choose to consume as a result and how such...
Can outreach to people with criminal records -- a hard-to-find group based on traditional data sources -- increase registration and voting behavior for this group? Does the success of such outreach efforts vary across key subgroups? How do these effects...
Millions of people in the US are eligible to vote despite past felony convictions, but their voter participation rates are extraordinarily low. Efforts to register and mobilize this population have foundered due to data limitations. In this pilot project, we...
Evictions, both informal and court-ordered, are one of the most common pathways to homelessness, but proven interventions to interrupt this pathway are few. Two of three rigorous studies completed in this area show that providing a lawyer to a defendant in...
Millions of people in the US are eligible to vote despite past felony convictions, but their voter participation rates are extraordinarily low. Efforts to register and mobilize this population have foundered due to data limitations. In this pilot project, we...
In this project, we provide new evidence on the reasons that firms are unwilling to hire workers with a past criminal conviction, as well as what types of policies might increase employment rates among these workers. The context for our study is a large online...
We propose a stratified correspondence study of large American employers aimed at detecting firm-level discrimination on the basis of race, sex, and age. To construct accurate firm-level estimates, 125 (geographically distinct) job vacancies will be sampled...
Childcare services have important long-term effects on children’s human capital, and likely have important financial implications for low income families. For these reasons, state, local and federal programs provide subsidized childcare and school readiness...
Despite widespread public attention to the opioid epidemic and numerous policies to prevent opioid misuse, overdose deaths in the United States increased 16 percent per annum between 2014 and 2017. Public health authorities consider naloxone, a prescription...
The proposed study investigates how technology-assisted behavioral interventions can help individuals improve their sleep habits in order to improve educational outcomes. In prior work, we find that incentives for meeting sleep goals increase sleep and also...
Strong relationships with non-parental adults are associated with greater student success. Despite this, many children receive little educational support from adults in their families’ social networks – even from those with whom they have relationships. This...
Over the last four years, Professor Oreopoulos been researching how online exercises, text messages, emails, and electronic calendars can be used to improve college academic achievement. The platform design works remarkably well in getting students to engage...
In this project, we provide new evidence on the reasons that firms are unwilling to hire workers with a past criminal conviction, as well as what types of policies might increase employment rates among these workers. The context for our study is a large online...
Community colleges offer great promise to help students build human capital. Yet three-fifths of current students report being ill informed about career opportunities, one-third want more academic advising, and fewer than half of community college students...
The purpose of this research is to study the effects of Urban Initiatives’ Work to Play program, an out-ofschool- time program that primarily serves 3rd and 4th grade children. Our central research question is whether participation in this structured sports...
Sara Heller (University of Pennsylvania), in collaboration with the Philadelphia Youth Network, the Philadelphia Mayor’s Office, and the Philadelphia Department of Human Services, is conducting a pilot study of WorkReady, a summer jobs program for...
The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is the largest means-tested cash transfer program in the United States, and accounts for a significant share of income for those who receive it. As opposed to most other federal and state transfer programs, the credit is...
Community colleges enroll approximately 40 percent of all US undergraduates and they enroll a disproportionate share of low-income and first-generation college students in higher education. For instance, low-income college students are three times more likely...
Reducing violent crime, recidivism, and incarceration are top policy priorities for jurisdictions across the country. In this pilot project, we will assign jail inmates to play a video game designed to teach and provide opportunities to practice cognitive...
The Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) is the largest means-tested cash transfer program in the United States, and accounts for a significant share of income for those who receive it. As opposed to most other federal and state transfer programs, the credit is...
Summer Youth Employment Programs (SYEPs) are city-run programs which provide youth with paid work during the summer. These programs have been shown to improve important youth outcomes including criminality, incarceration, and mortality. However, researchers...
Despite a universal insurance mandate, 30 million drivers in the United States do not carry the minimum automobile liability insurance required by law. Traditional auto insurance contracts charge a fixed monthly premium to cover unlimited driving, making them...
This project aims to evaluate the effectiveness of a classroom-based program intended to increase the vocabulary of preschool and primary school children. The program, called the Big Word Club (BWC), consists of videos, books and activities intended to help...
In a jurisdiction where failure to appear (FTA) at an arraignment leads to a default judgment against the defendant, additional fines, suspension of drivers’ licenses, and a warrant, about one-third of defendants nevertheless FTA. In collaboration with a large...
More than 43 million people in the United States live in poverty. Poverty is particularly pervasive in the city of Rochester, NY where rates are more than twice the national average. The Rochester-Monroe Anti-Poverty Initiative (RMAPI), in partnership with the...
In 2014, nearly 40% of individuals issued a ticket for a violation in New York City did not show up to court, and were issued an arrest warrant as a result. Given this stiff penalty, it might seem that people would only miss court if they deliberately chose to...
Many social scientists and policy makers express concern over low levels of college completion and poor overall academic performance. One explanation, drawing on recent insights from behavioral science, suggests that youth often overemphasize the present or...
Given that the nationwide three-year graduation rate for community college students is about 30 percent (National Center for Education Statistics), it is extremely important to understand what types of services have the biggest impact on outcomes like credit...
Many American high school students know only the sticker price of college and make application decisions without properly incorporating the availability of extensive financial aid, particularly at elite colleges and universities. School counselors often cannot...
Despite being identified as a key contributor to student shortcomings, procrastination in education has received little attention from the behavioral economics and the economics of education literatures. This project examines the role of commitment and...
The purpose of this research is to study the effects of Urban Initiatives’ Work to Play program, an out-ofschool- time program that primarily serves 3rd and 4th grade children. Our central research question is whether participation in this structured sports...
Financial incentives for students have recently been tested as a possible solution to poor student achievement. Past research has shown modest effects on average, and suggestive evidence that incentives for inputs (that is, student effort) outperform...
Many social scientists and policy makers express concern over low levels of college completion and poor overall academic performance. One explanation, drawing on recent insights from behavioral science, suggests that youth often overemphasize the present or...
Marianne Bertrand (University of Chicago), in collaboration with the Chicago Department of Family & Support Services, is conducting a large-scale randomized controlled trial (RCT) of the summer jobs program One Summer Chicago Plus (OSC+). OSC+ offers part-time...
Sara Heller (University of Pennsylvania), in collaboration with the Philadelphia Youth Network, the Philadelphia Mayor’s Office, and the Philadelphia Department of Human Services, is conducting a pilot study of WorkReady, a summer jobs program for...
Financial incentives for students have recently been tested as a possible solution to poor student achievement. Past research has shown modest effects on average, and suggestive evidence that incentives for inputs (that is, student effort) outperform...
In the United States, low- and moderate-income (“LMI”) individuals experience personal financial crisis through the lens of law. Small claims court debt collection, bankruptcy court, and contract negotiations with creditors dominate the experience. But LMI...
Community colleges enroll approximately 40 percent of all US undergraduates and they enroll a disproportionate share of low-income and first-generation college students in higher education. For instance, low-income college students are three times more likely...
The success of interventions aiming to encourage pro-social behavior is often measured by how the interventions affect behavior rather than how they affect welfare. We propose a natural field experiment to measure the welfare effects of one especially policy...
Despite the long-term decline in adolescent pregnancy rates, adolescent pregnancy remains an important policy issue in the United States. In 2011, teen births accounted for 8.4% of all births and 18.4% of all nonmarital births (Martin et al. 2013, 22)...
This study will evaluate a community college intervention program that is currently being implemented with a randomized controlled trial (RCT) design on a campus in Fort Worth, Texas. The program is designed to address the “life barriers” – as distinct from...
This project will conduct pilot activities for a randomized controlled trial investigating the impacts of behaviorally-informed “nudges” on savings or debt reduction behavior at tax time. We will partner with VITA sites operated by the Baltimore CASH Campaign...
This pilot project aims to design and test, in the laboratory and in selected preschools, three sets of math games for preschool children living in poverty in the U.S. The games build on decades of basic research on the foundations of mathematical competence...
Recent evidence suggests that programs aimed at increasing “mindfulness” are successful at reducing the cognitive demands of stress and increasing focus and attention. This pilot study would be the first to apply this approach to improving parenting among...
Despite the long-term decline in adolescent pregnancy rates, adolescent pregnancy remains an important policy issue in the United States. In 2011, teen births accounted for 8.4% of all births and 18.4% of all nonmarital births (Martin et al. 2013, 22)...
The success of interventions aiming to encourage pro-social behavior is often measured by how the interventions affect behavior rather than how they affect welfare. We propose a natural field experiment to measure the welfare effects of one especially policy...
JPAL-NA affiliate Jens Ludwig (University of Chicago) is carrying out a large-scale RCT with the Chicago Public Schools and Match Education of Boston to test whether intensive, individuated instruction (two-on-one daily tutoring for an hour a day) can improve...
JPAL-NA affiliate Jens Ludwig (University of Chicago) is carrying out a large-scale RCT with the Chicago Public Schools and Match Education of Boston to test whether intensive, individuated instruction (two-on-one daily tutoring for an hour a day) can improve...
This project will study how tax-code complexity and information frictions impact college enrollment. The project will be based on a randomized control trial (RCT) conducted in collaboration with the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board (THECB)...
The United States federal income tax provides tax benefits for households with college-enrolled students. Nonetheless, the complexity of the tax code may prevent eligible individuals from fully taking advantage of this financial aid for college. In this...