Today's comments focus on a study done in Vancouver of the effect of large lump sum payments to homeless people. While the premise and results of the study are interesting on their own merits, I want to draw your attention to the methodology used by the researchers, i.e., a randomized trial.
This approach is very much in line with what the folks at the J-PAL (Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab) do. This link will take you to a selection of their randomized evaluations.
It is worth noting that two of the lab's founders, Esther Duflo and Abhijit Banerjee, won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Economics (along with Michael Kremer) for their work in studying poverty. I highly recommend Banerjee and Duflo's book Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty to my IR students.
If you are interested in a shorter read, you can read their JEP paper "The Economic Lives of the Poor."
Here is my video:
BTW- I commented on one of the topics in Poor Economics in this back in 2014
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