Dream Big And Work Hard Like Gita Gopinath A Simple Indian Girl Who Is Now IMF Chief Economist

Gita Gopinath was born and brought up in a middle-class Indian family. She did her graduation and post graduation in Economics from Delhi. She also did a post-graduation in Economics from Washington University, USA. Gita is currently an Indian-American economist. She was appointed as chief economist of the International Monetary Fund in October 2018. Gita Gopinath has done her Ph.D. on International Finance and Macroeconomics. She is the John Zwaanstra Professor of International Studies and Economics at Harvard University. Gita is also a co-director of the International Finance and Macroeconomics program at the National Bureau of Economic Research.

Gita was on December 8, 1971. She is the younger of two daughters. Her father is TV Gopinath and mother VC Vijayalakshmi. Her hometown is Mysuru, Karnataka. Gita is married to Iqbal Singh Dhaliwal, Executive Director at Abdul Latif J-PAL at the Department of Economics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Iqbal was the topper of the Indian Administrative Services (IAS) exam in 1996.

She completed her Ph.D. from Princeton University (1996-2001) specializing in International Macroeconomics and Trade. At Princeton, famous economist Ken Rogoff and former chairman of the US Federal Reserve Ben Bernanke influenced her. Gita Gopinath is only the third woman and second Indian after Nobel laureate Amartya Sen to be made a permanent member of the economics department at Harvard.

Gita is also the Managing Editor of Harvard’s Review of Economic Studies. She is also co-director of the International Finance and Macroeconomics program at the National Bureau of Economic Research, a visiting scholar at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, member of the economic advisory panel of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

Gopinath is also co-editor of the American Economic Review, co-editor of the current Handbook of International Economics and was managing editor of the Review of Economic Studies. She has also served as a member of the Eminent Persons Advisory Group on G-20 Matters for India’s ministry of finance.

Before Harvard, Gita was an assistant professor of economics at the University of Chicago’s Graduate School of Business from 2001 to 2005. She is the second Indian after Raghuram Rajan to hold the prestigious post at the IMF. Gopinath had also been named as one of the top 25 economists under the age of 45 by the International Monetary Fund in 2014 and was chosen as a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum in 2011

Raghuram Rajan was Chief Economist and Director of Research at the International Monetary Fund from 2003 to 2006. In 2018, Gita was elected a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, working for the advancement and study of the key societal, scientific, and intellectual issues of the day.

In 2017, Gita Gopinath received the Department of Economics Distinguished Alumnus Award, University of Washington.

In 2015, Gita Gopinath was included into the Women Achievers Hall of Fame, MYRA School of Business, Mysore, India. She has written around 40 research articles on exchange rates, trade and investment, international financial crises, monetary policy, debt, and emerging market crises. She has also written the Handbook of International Economics, Volume 5, 2014.

The life story of Gita Gopinath a simple middle-class Indian girl who went to become IMF Chief Economist proves, nothing is impossible for any woman who believes in herself and chases her dreams passionately. I wish you all beautiful women out there good luck and success like Gita Gopinath! Keep rocking you all Wonderful Women!