[2] In 1980, Burt received his Bachelor of Arts degree in public administration and inter-American studies from the University of the Pacific in Stockton, California, where he served as student body president.

[5] Burt has a long career in public service, non-profit work, and academia, including serving as Mayor of Asuncion and founding Fundación Paraguaya.

In 1995, Fundación Paraguaya established their implementation of the Junior Achievement Program in Paraguay, which focuses on teaching concepts of entrepreneurship and financial literacy.

In 2006, Burt co-founded Teach a Man to Fish, a UK charity based in London, England with Nik Kafka, a former intern with the foundation, in order to spread the student-led school business model.

The platform has been adopted by the Paraguayan government and Burt is working with organizations in Mexico, Nigeria, Tanzania, and Uganda to bring the stoplight model to their local efforts.

These indicators, such as access to clean water or clothing, are rated at three levels, green, yellow, and red, allowing an easy to read scorecard to be developed.

[10][11][12] Burt served as chief of staff, Cabinet Secretary and close adviser to President Federico Franco from 2012 to 2013, where he helped lead the government's adoption of the Social Progress Index, an alternative economic indicator to the Gross Domestic Product.

In concert with the Salesian Works and Ministry of Social Action, he helped build collective housing for families displaced from the Chaco.

[17] Burt is currently a distinguished visiting professor at the University of California, Irvine and a social entrepreneur in Residence at the Worcester Polytechnic Institute.

[21] This area of 65,000 hectares is home to Paraguayan and Brazilian cattle ranchers and small holdings, two indigenous groups, and a wide variety of species and ecosystems.

[23][24] Burt also co-founded Lican Paraguay SA, a social enterprise that processes formerly contaminating animal blood from slaughterhouses and converts it into hemoglobin and plasma, profits going to save the Mbaracayú Forest Reserve.

[46][47] Martin has been a speaker at the Aspen Ideas Festival, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals, UNIAPAC, CAF – Development Bank of Latin America and the Caribbean, World Islamic Economic Forum (WIEF), Synergos, Eisenhower Fellowships, ICERI 2014, and Development, as well as at TEDxPuraVida and TEDxBYU.

[60] He presented the Poverty Stoplight methodology at the 2017 Istanbul Innovation Days Conference organized by UNDP Turkey and Nesta.

[62] At the end of 2019, Burt presented the Draft Bill Establishing Guidelines for Poverty Elimination in Paraguay, at a public hearing organized by the National Congress.