The Business podcast: Greece and the effectiveness of international aid

Greek prime minister George Papandreou 's government survived a confidence vote this week , but as his country's debt crisis worsens the IMF has called on European leaders to act decisively. Observer economics editor Heather Stewart and banking expert Jill Treanor weigh up the options for policymakers and assess the exposure of Europe's banks to what some analysts fear could be another " Lehman Brothers moment ". Also this week: we hear from the authors of a new book called Poor Economics , Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo . Their approach to development economics involves randomised trials: one test group gets an anti-poverty remedy, the other doesn't, and conclusions are drawn by keeping other variables under control as much as possible. It's led to them being affectionately labeled "randomistas" by their peers, and the approach is catching on among policymakers. But how far can their methods be applied?