We need to start thinking of the poor as very much like the rest of us: Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee

Kolkata, Jan. 28 -- Nobel laureate economist Abhijit Vinayak Banerjee asked people to rethink how they look at poverty, saying that the poor are often judged in ways that ignore how similar their lives and choices are to everyone else's.

Speaking at the Exide Kolkata Literary Meet 2026, Banerjee pointed out that the poor are frequently judged for their choices without any real understanding of the pressure they live under. "We have to start thinking of the poor as very much like the rest of us: curious and confused, generous and selfish, subject to misjudgments and multiple contradictions. We created a hierarchy of need based on some abstract theory, which didn't happen to be true."Banerjee stated that policies frequently fail because they...