Michael Faye and Paul Niehaus spent summers as Harvard graduate students trying to give cash to the poor in the villages of…

Ackman-Backed Harvard Grads Make  

Aiding the Poor a New Business

Disponível em: www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-09- 21/ackman-backed-harvard-grads-make-aiding-the-poor-a-new-business. Acessado em 30/09/2015. Reorganizado e adaptado para fins educacionais.

Sangwon Yoon

 Michael Faye and Paul Niehaus spent summers as Harvard graduate students trying to give cash to the poor in the villages of Kenya. The villagers were perplexed; development experts thought the two had lost their minds. People who live on less than a dollar a day, the experts said, were sure to spend the money on cigarettes and alcohol.Seven years later, the idea is upending the international aid industry. Giving cash directly to the very poor turns out to be more efficient and productive than when charities with high overhead distribute goods and food. Those in extreme need take the cash and use it wisely. Giving a year's income of $1,000 to Kenyans who live on about 60 cents a day via mobile banking system M-Pesa, showed a 34 percent increase in earnings and a 52 percent rise in assets. Beneficiaries invested the cash, buying livestock and land for longer-term returns. Heavyweight investors such as Mr Ackman, from Ackman's Pershing Square Foundation, have decided to back the former grads' project, transforming it into a new business.