Sonia Laszlo

Prof. Sonia Laszlo is a Professor of Economics at McGill University’s Faculty of Arts, specializing in applied microeconomic analysis within economic development. Her research focuses on decision-making under uncertainty among subsistence farmers and the microeconomic effects of social policies on women’s well-being, particularly in Peru, Kenya, Paraguay, and the Caribbean. She employs experimental methods such as laboratory experiments, surveys, and randomized controlled trials.

She is affiliated with the Centre Interuniversitaire de Recherche en Organizations (CIRANO) and the Grupo de Análisis para el Desarrollo (GRADE). As a co-founder and executive member of the Canadian Development Economics Study Group (CDESG), she bridges academic and policy communities in Canada. From 2016 to 2019, she served as Director of McGill’s Institute for the Study of International Development.

Her research themes include gender norms, social protection programs, childcare access, and flood risk mitigation in Amazonian agriculture. Recent projects examine the impact of childcare subsidies on women’s employment in Kenyan urban slums and the transformative potential of graduation programs targeting gender equality.

Notable contributions include analyzing long-term health consequences of civil conflict in Peru, the distributional effects of bribery in developing economies, and the role of ambiguity aversion in farming decisions. Her work emphasizes policy relevance, particularly in post-pandemic childcare provision and equitable economic recovery strategies.