Greek American Pinelopi Koujianou-Goldberg, a Professor of Economics at Yale University, has been appointed the new World Bank Group Chief Economist this week.
Ms Koujianou-Goldberg a Greek and American national who was born and bred in Greece, is also the first woman to have been appointed as editor of the American Economic Review (2011-2017).
The 55-year-old left Greece after completing her studies at the University of Athens having received a prestigious scholarship from the German Academic Exchange Service to study economics at the University of Freiburg. Her performance lead to another scholarship this time from the Onassis Foundation offering her a rare chance to further her education at Stanford.
In addition top her long resume and achievement as a leading applied microeconomist, the Greek academic is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and a recipient of fellowships from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. Ms Koujianou-Goldberg is widely known for her research on developing countries, investigating into the effects of trade on inequality and firm productivity, profits and innovation, and enforcement of intellectual property rights. She has won the 2003 Bodossaki Prize in Social Sciences, which is awarded to distinguished scholars of Greek nationality or decent by Yale University and has previously served on the economics faculty at Princeton and Columbia.
“I’m thrilled that Penny Goldberg will bring her vast academic experience, intellectual rigor, and boundless curiosity to the World Bank Group,” World Bank Group President Jim Yong Kim said in a statement.
“Penny has spent her career examining many of the most complex issues that affect developing countries, and she will help answer the most important – and difficult – questions of our time: how to help developing countries prepare for the economy of the future, and how to ensure equality of opportunity everywhere in the world.”