On Saturday, development professionals gathered to show their solidarity and demand justice for the students killed during the quota reform movement, also calling for reform within the state machinery. Around 1,000 professionals from various organizations attended the rally organized by the "Development Professionals Alliance for Freedom and Justice" at Justice Shahabuddin Ahmed Park in Gulshan, Dhaka. The event began with the national anthem, gradually drawing in hundreds of development professionals, parents, passersby, and students. Rubaiyath Sarwar, a d...

More than 100 countries—including China, India, Brazil, and South Africa—face serious obstacles that could hinder their efforts to become high-income countries in the next few decades, according to a new World Bank study that provides the first comprehensive roadmap to enable developing countries to escape the “middle-income trap.” Drawing on lessons of the past 50 years, the World Development Report 2024 : The Middle Income Trap finds that as countries grow wealthier, they usually hit a “trap” at about 10% of annual U.S. GDP per person—the equivalent of $8,000 today. That’s in the middle of the range of what the World Bank classifies as “middle-income” countries. Since 1990, only 34 middle-income economies have ma...