Chief Economist and Director of the Research Department of International Monetary Fund (IMF), Gita Gopinath, is set to leave her job in January 2022.

Highlights

• She will return to the prestigious Harvard University, after leaving the job.
• The Indian-American economist had joined the IMF in January 2019, as the Chief Economist.
• When she joined IMF, she was working as John Zwaanstra Professor of International Studies and Economics at Harvard University.
• Harvard University had extended her leave of absence by one year on an exceptional basis. This allowed her to serve as Chief Economist for three years at the IMF.
• She is the first-ever woman Chief Economist of the IMF.

Background

Gita Gopinath was born in December 1971 to Malayalee parents. She did her schooling in Kolkata. She completed her graduation from the Lady Shri Ram College of Commerce in Delhi. She had her Masters from the Delhi School of Economics and University of Washington. She then completed Ph.D in economics from Princeton University in 2001. She was guided by Ben Bernanke, Kenneth Rogoff, and Pierre-Olivier Gourinchas. In the year 2001, she joined the University of Chicago as an Assistant Professor and moved to Harvard in 2005. In the year 2010, she became a tenured Professor there. She is only the third woman in Harvard to be a tenured professor at economics department. She is also the first Indian following Nobel laureate Amartya Sen to hold this position at Harvard.