Danny Leipziger

Danny Leipziger - Vice President for Poverty Reduction and Economic Management (PREM) and Head of the PREM Network of more than 700 economists and other professionals working on economic policy, lending, and analytic work for the World Bank’s client countries.  In this capacity he provides strategic leadership and direction to Regional PREM units as well as groups working on economic policy formulation in the area of growth and poverty, debt, trade, gender, and public sector management and governance.  He is heavily involved in positioning the Bank on major economic policy issues and in managing the Bank’s overall interactions on these issues with key partner institutions – including the IMF, OECD, regional development banks and the European Union.  He works closely with Regional Vice Presidents on leading edge and cross-country economic matters and reports to the President of the World Bank.

Previous Bank assignments include Director for Finance, Private Sector and Infrastructure in the Latin America and Caribbean Region and managerial assignments at the World Bank Institute and in the East Asia and Pacific Region of the Bank.  Career highlights include leading the Bank’s first ($3 billion) economic recovery loan for Korea in 1997, managing the program of bank restructuring in Argentina in the post-Tequila financial crisis in 1995, and opening the economic dialogue with Vietnam in 1989-1990.  Dr. Leipziger previously served in the Economic Bureau of the U.S. Department of State and on its Policy Planning Staff, where he was an economic advisor to the Secretary of State, as well as in USAID.  Dr. Leipziger was Adjunct Professor, Graduate School of International Economics and Finance, Brandeis University (2001-2004). He led the World Bank Delegation to the Hong Kong Trade Ministerial, where he was the Bank’s spokesperson.

Dr. Leipziger, a Ph. D. in economics from Brown University, has written extensively on development economics and finance, and has lectured widely on industrial policy, financial crisis management, and development experience. He has authored several books on Korea and East Asia, including Lessons from East Asia (University of Michigan, 1997), Preventing Banking Crises (1998), Korea: Transition to Maturity (1988), and Chile: Policy Lessons (1999). He has published more than 30 articles in economic journals and spoken often to various audiences on development policy and global economic issues.  Recent published work has dealt with Privatization of Infrastructure Services, Moral Hazard Behavior in International Lending, and the Role of Infrastructure in Achieving the MDGs. He currently serves as Vice Chair of the Commission on Growth and Development, a high level panel led by Nobel laureate Mike Spence; he also is leading World Bank efforts on the Gender Action Plan, its Governance and Growth agenda; and relations with the IMF.

He is fluent in Spanish and German.