Comments On: Understanding and Misunderstanding Randomized Controlled Trials By Cartwright and Deaton

Deaton and Cartwright (DC2017 from hereon) view the increasing popularity of randomized experiments in social sciences with some skepticism. They are concerned about the quality of the inferences in practice, and fear that researchers may not fully appreciate the pitfalls and limitations of such experiments. I am more sanguine about the recent developments in empirical practice in economics and other social sciences, and am optimistic about the ongoing research in this area, both empirical and theoretical.