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Welcome! I am the Gantcher Associate Professor of Business (without tenure) in the Economics Division at Columbia Business School.

My research primarily focuses on working conditions, labor rights, and firm productivity in developing countries. I am especially interested in how the intersection of global supply chains with local institutions affect firms’ and workers’ outcomes and how labor market institutions affect economic development.

I am a Faculty Research Fellow at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) in Development Economics, an Affiliate of the Bureau for Research and Economic Analysis of Development (BREAD), a Research Fellow at the Center for Economic Policy Research (CEPR) in Organizational Economics, and a research affiliate of the Institute of Labor Economics (IZA). I am also affiliated to the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab (J-PAL), International Growth Centre (IGC), the Chazen Institute for Global Business, and the Columbia Center for Development Economics and Policy (CDEP). I am an IGC lead academic for Bangladesh.

Curriculum Vitae (Link)
E-mail: l.boudreau@columbia.edu

Working Papers

Monitoring Harassment in Organizations – with Sylvain Chassang, Ada González-Torres, and Rachel Heath
Revise and Resubmit, Review of Economic Studies

Supplementary Materials

Coverage: The Visible Hand Podcast; VoxDev Column; World Bank Development Impact Blog; Business Scholarship Podcast

Policy briefs: J-PAL Summary; PEDL Research Note

We experimentally evaluate secure survey methods for monitoring harassment in organizations. We partner with a Bangladeshi garment manufacturer and survey its workers. “Hard garbling” responses to sensitive questions, i.e., automatically recording a random subset as complaints, increases reporting of physical harassment by 290%, sexual harassment by 271%, and threatening behavior by 45%, from rates of 1.5%, 1.8%, and 9.9% under direct elicitation. Rapport-building and removing team identifiers do not increase reporting. We show that garbled reports can be used to consistently estimate policy-relevant statistics of reported harassment. In our data, harassment is widespread, most managers partake, and victims are isolated.

Refereed Publications

Leaders in Social Movements: Evidence from Unions in Myanmar  – with Rocco Macchiavello, Virginia Minni, and Mari Tanaka (American Economic Review (2025), 115(6), 1975–2000)

Supplementary Materials

Coverage: VoxDev Column; Faculti Video

Policy briefs: J-PAL Summary; Jerome A. Chazen Institute for Global Business Research Brief

Multinational enforcement of labor law: Experimental evidence on strengthening occupational safety and health (OSH) committees (Econometrica (2024), 92(4), 1269–1308)

Supplementary Materials

Coverage: Trade Talks Interview (Podcast); Review by ProMarket;  VoxDev Talks Interview (Podcast); The Daily Star (Bangladesh)

Policy briefs: International Growth Centre Blog Post; Jerome A. Chazen Institute for Global Business Research Brief; J-PAL Summary

Migrants, experience, and working conditions in Bangladeshi Garment Factories– with Rachel Heath and Tyler McCormick (Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization (2024), 219, 196–213)

Non-Refereed Publications

International Trade and Development(Issue 2), Atkin, David, Khandelwhal, Amit, et al. VoxDevLit Vol. 4, No. 2 (2025): 1-61. (Issue 1, 2022)

Foreign Direct Investment and Development, Garetto, Stefania, Pavcnik, Nina, Ramondo, Natalia, et al. VoxDevLit Vol. 13, No. 1 (2025): 1-77.

Global Value Chains in Developing Countries: a Perspective from Coffee and Garments  -with Julia Cajal-Grossi and Rocco Macchiavello (Journal of Economic Perspectives (2023), 37(3), 59–86) – Coverage: VoxDev Podcast

Work in Progress

Labor Unions and Pro-Democracy Resistance  – with Rocco Macchiavello, Virginia Minni, and Mari Tanaka

Escrow Mechanisms for Group-based Reporting: Evidence from Bangladesh’s Garments Sector – with Sylvain Chassang and Ada González-Torres (PAP accepted via pre-results review at the Journal of Development Economics)

Relationships and Responsibility – with Julia Cajal-Grossi, Canyon Can, and Rocco Macchiavello

Gender and Communication in the Workplace – with Sakib Mahmood and Oren Reshef

Information about Local Wages and Amenities, Beliefs, and Worker Outcomes – with Md. Shakil Ahmed and Rachel Heath

Market-based Information to Predict Small Firms’ Marginal Returns to Capital and Other Business Support Services – with Amanda Awadey and Elwyn Davies