If I told you it’s possible to deliver an extra year of ideal primary-level education for 30 cents, would you believe me? Hopefully not – the claim is absurd on its face.

But it may be true nonetheless. The very best education interventions are phenomenally cost-effective, but they’re not the kinds of things you’d expect, says Dr Rachel Glennerster — who we chose to introduce the problem of global poverty.

Full transcript, related links, and summary of this interview

This episode first broadcast on the regular 80,000 Hours Podcast feed on December 20, 2018. Some related episodes include:

#13 – Claire Walsh on testing which policies work & how to get governments to listen to the results
#18 – Ofir Reich on using data science to end poverty & the spurious action-inaction distinction
#22 – Dr Leah Utyasheva on the non-profit that figured out how to massively cut suicide rates
#30 – Dr Eva Vivalt on how little social science findings generalize from one study to another
#37 – GiveWell picks top charities by estimating the unknowable. James Snowden on how they do it.
#38 – Prof Yew-Kwang Ng on anticipating EA decades ago & how to make a much happier world
And #55 – Mark Lutter & Tamara Winter on founding charter cities with outstanding governance to end poverty

Series produced by Keiran Harris.

599: 7 tips for upgrading your podcast content strategy in 2026.