Esther Duflo

Esther Duflo, FBA (French: [dyflo]; born 25 October 1972) is a French-American economist^[1] currently serving as the Abdul Latif Jameel Professor of Poverty Alleviation and Development Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).^[2] In 2019, she was jointly awarded the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences alongside Abhijit Banerjee and Michael Kremer "for their experimental approach to alleviating global poverty".^[3]

In addition to her academic appointment, Duflo is the co-founder and co-director of the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL),^[2] an MIT-based research center promoting the use of randomized controlled trials in policy evaluation.^[4] As of 2020, more than 400 million people had been impacted by programs tested by J-PAL affiliated researchers.^[5] Since 2024, Duflo has also served as the president of the Paris School of Economics alongside her appointment at MIT.^[6]

Duflo is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER),^[7] a board member of the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development (BREAD),^[8] and the director of the development economics program of the Centre for Economic Policy Research.^[7] Her research focuses on the microeconomics of development and spans topics such as household behavior,^[9] education,^[9][10] financial inclusion,^[4] political economy,^[10] gender,^[10] and health.^[11] Prior to receiving the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, Duflo was awarded the Elaine Bennett Research Prize (2002)^[9] and John Bates Clark Medal (2010)^[10] by the American Economic Association.

Together with Abhijit Banerjee, Duflo is the co-author of Poor Economics^[11] and Good Economics for Hard Times,^[12] published in April 2011 and November 2019, respectively. According to the Open Syllabus Project, Duflo is the seventh most frequently cited author on college syllabi for economics courses.^[13]