As you might expect, given how entrepreneurially minded the recipients are, the researchers found no evidence that any of the payments discouraged work or increased purchases of alcohol — two common criticisms of direct cash giving. In fact, so many people who used to work for wages instead started businesses that there was less competition for wage work, and overall wages in villages rose as a result.

posted my comment on Tildes with links:

This research studied the charity of a foundation called GiveDirectly that specializes in cash transfers, and studying their effects. One of the authors is its co-founder.

I recently stumbled across this foundation in this GiveWell blog post of their 2019 top charities. I found this to be by far the most compelling on the list, both for their direct impact, and their support of research like this, which can go a long way to dispelling myths, and supporting more evidence-based charity as well as policies in developed countries like universal basic income.

They also have a page called GDLive in beta, which lists unedited survey responses to questions like personal impact, what could be improved, what the money was spent on, etc. If I find myself catastrophising my own problems, I find going there helps put my own problems into perspective, reminding me how privileged I am to have won the global birth lottery to have been born to hard-working immigrants that had the education and means to move to Canada (noticing the "invisible things that make my life easier" which "explains why most of us aren’t nearly as grateful as we ought to be" Freakonomics: Why Is My Life So Hard?). It's shocking to see how much of a life-altering difference a cash donation can make to these people, in amounts that often seem paltry to me.

in-depth explanation of the efficiency of increasing developed country public spending on clean energy research and development, which through technology spillover can benefit developing countries, not punish them, unlike cruder methods like carbon limits, criticized as disproportionately hurting developing countries that are most reliant on fossil fuel for economic growth