He studied at the Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School before going to Balliol College, Oxford, graduating with a degree in Philosophy, politics and economics.
[6][7] Lipton's research focused on developmental studies, specifically, rural development and poverty reduction.
[2] Lipton's partnership with Myrdal helped him write "The Theory of the Optimising Peasant" (1968), a paper in which he challenged the then prevailing assumption that small and poor farmers were backward and conservative.
Lipton wrote against the prevailing notion about poor farmers that they were wasteful, by stating that grain losses on their farms were often low.
[3] Lipton's work helped challenge the notion that development could only result from industrialization, which often came at the expense of rural areas through high taxation.
[2] Lipton worked with various governmental and non-governmental agencies, advising countries such as India, Bangladesh, Botswana, Ethiopia, Sudan and South Africa.
[2][3] He also wrote the first Rural Poverty report for the United Nations' International Fund for Agricultural Development in 2001.
He also proposed land reforms in southern Africa which were built on market-based approaches to solve historical inequalities.