Search this site
Visual representation of Adriana Kugler

Expertise

  • Immigration
  • Labor Markets and Labor Policy
  • Monetary Policy

Email

ak659@georgetown.edu

Link

GU360 Profile

Adriana Kugler

Professor

Dr. Adriana Kugler is Full Professor at the McCourt School of Public Policy and Economics where she has been back from a leave of absence since August 11, 2025. She was Governor of the Federal Reserve Board from September 2023 to August 2025. Prior to that position, she served as the U.S. Executive Director of the World Bank. Dr. Kugler received the Chase Award for her leadership and contributions to the Multilateral Development Banks' Evolution awarded by the U.S. Department of the Treasury. She was also recently recognized as one of the100 Most Influential Women In U.S. Finance by Barrons for two consecutive years in 2024 and 2025, as well as one of the top 500 most influential people of Latin America in 2023 by Bloomberg Linea. She was Vice Provost for Faculty at Georgetown between 2013 and 2016. In that role, she led numerous initiatives to clarify the processes and criteria for P&T, support faculty development (she received an NSF grant to support women in STEM), revamp the new faculty orientation, and develop a new framework for non-tenure faculty. She was the founder and Co-director of the International Summer Institute on Policy Evaluation between 2010-2013. She served as Chief Economist of the U.S. Department of Labor during the Obama Administration between 2011 and 2013, where she worked actively on developing policies and proposals on unemployment insurance, training programs, retirement benefits, overtime pay and minimum wages, immigration, disability insurance, and occupational safety regulations. Prior to coming to Georgetown, she was a Full and Associate Professor in the Economics departments at the University of Houston and at University Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona. Her research interests include labor markets and policy evaluation in developed and developing countries. Her work includes contributions to the role of public policies (including payroll taxes, employment protections, occupational licensing, and unemployment insurance), unemployment, and immigration. Her contribution on the impact of policies and regulations was recognized with the 2007 John T. Dunlop Outstanding Scholar Award from the Labor and Employment Relations Association. In 2010, one of her papers garnered the First Prize for Best Contribution in the area of “Globalization, Regulations and Development” from the Global Development Network. Her work has been published in the top general interest and specialized journals in Economics and Public Policy, including the American Economic Review, the Review of Economic & Statistics, the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, the Economic Journal, the Journal of Labor Economics, the Journal of Human Resources, the Journal of Public Economics, the Journal of Development Economics, Economic Development and Cultural Change, Demography, Economics and Human Biology and the Journal of Policy Reform. Her research has been covered in multiple reports, including the World Development Report published by the World Bank, and the annual development reports published by the Inter-American Development Bank and the OECD. Professor Kugler has received grants from the NSF, the U.K. Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Tinker Foundation, the Spanish Ministry of Science and Technology, CEDLAS, Harvard's Evidence for Policy Design (EPoD), and the Center for Equitable Growth. Her research and policy work has been covered in The Economist magazine, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, the Financial Times, the LA Times, the Chicago Tribune, The Atlantic, The National Journal, The Hill, NBC Latino, BBC Mundo, CNN Money, CNN en Español, FoxBusiness, C-SPAN, Nightly Business News, CNBC, Univision, Telemundo, NTN24, and NPR. Dr. Kugler has testified as an expert witness in front of the Joint Economic Committee of Congress and has participated in numerous panels in Congress. As an undergraduate, Dr. Kugler was an intern for Senator Mikulski at a time when the Senator was a junior Senator and only one of two women in the Senate. Professor Kugler served on the Science Technology and Economic Policy (STEP) Board of the National Academies of Science and Engineering. She was Chair-elect (2019) and Chair (2020) of the Business and Economics Section of the American Statistical Association. In the past, she served on the Technical Advisory Committee of the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the Committee of Visitors of the NSF's Division of Social and Economic Sciences (SES). Professor Kugler is was an elected member of the Executive Committee of the Latin American and Caribbean Economic Association and was an elected member of the Executive Committee of the European Association of Labor Economists for 6 years. She was Associate Editor of the Industrial and Labor Relations Review and has served in the editorial boards of the Journal of Labor and Development, Labor Economics, Economia, and the British Journal of Labor Relations. She is a Research Associate of the National Bureau of Economic Research and Research Fellow of the Center for Economic Policy Research, Institute for the Study of Labor, Centre for Research and Analysis of Migration, and the Center for the Study of Poverty and Inequality at Stanford University. She was also Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress. Dr. Kugler earned her Ph.D. in Economics from the University of California at Berkeley in 1997 and her Joint BA in Economics and Political Science with First Class Honors from McGill University in Canada in 1991. Dr. Kugler finished high school in the public schools in Maryland.

What's New

  • NEW PUBLICATION: “U.S. Robot Impacts in Developing Countries: Evidence from Colombian Workers,” with Maurice Kugler and Rodimiro Rodrigo, forthcoming European Economic Review, July (2026).

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.euroecorev.2026.105373

  • I am thrilled and honored to have received the 2025 American Society of Hispanic Economists (ASHE) Academic Achievement Award (https://asheweb.org/2025-ashe-academic-achievement-award-recipient/).
  • I was nominated by President Biden to be a Governor of the Federal Reserve Board (https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2023/05/12/president-biden-announces-nominees-to-the-federal-reserve-board-of-governors/) and confirmed by the U.S. Senate on September 7th, 2023. I served at the Fed from September 13th, 2023 until August 8, 2025.
  • 100 Most Influential Women In U.S. Finance, Barrons, March 2025 and March 2024.
  • I was presented with the Chase Award by the U.S. Department of Treasury for my leadership and contributions to the MDB Evolution Team, June 2023.
  • I was recognized as one of the top 500 most influential people of Latin America in 2023 by Bloomberg Linea.
  • I was nominated by President Biden for the position of US Executive Director of the World Bank: (https://mccourt.georgetown.edu/news/biden-nominates-mccourt-professor/) and confirmed by the U.S. Senate on April 7th, 2022.
  • I served as a member of the National Academies' Board of Science, Technology, and Economic Policy STEP (2019 - 2022).

Public Presentations and Panels

  • London School of Economics Center for Macroeconomics:https://youtu.be/46x4GIhWHZY?si=3tPpu9MW71BTM7AI
  • Reagan National Economic Forum: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wBsu3A2GBJE.
  • The Economic Club of New York: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzQZfg1tXq8
  • Berkeley Commencement Speech: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndqAg-M3Sqw
  • Heller-Hurwicz Economics Institute, University of Minnesota: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBHMEYZHACY
  • 2025 Whittington Lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33tijvnLkGE
  • Princeton University: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-XQvgBBfKg
  • Economic Club of Miami: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYmBMuRHl3g
  • Detroit Economic Club: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wY-YR0NoZYs
  • ECB Conference on Monetary Policy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N-0lPGCEGKQ
  • Mossavar-Rahmani Center Harvard University: https://www.hks.harvard.edu/centers/mrcbg/publications/economic-outlook-and-road-ahead
  • The Peterson Institute: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=roj5dKOQkWA
  • Washington University in St. Louis: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpFScg4RRyY
  • SIEPR Economic Summit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WdrsEeUfw6U&list=PLs-p47TpkzbelJPnclkeOqEMh5S000OU-&index=5
  • The Brookings: https://www.brookings.edu/events/a-conversation-with-federal-reserve-governor-adriana-d-kugler/
  • The Economist panel with Jagadish Bhagwati: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRnAekrO54A
  • Hamilton Project Presentation introduced by Joe Biden with Jared Bernstein: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gT_S_KHf7ko&t=80s
  • Federal Reserve System Conference with Bill Spriggs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rHKmB6AIKyk&t=9s
  • Century Foundation Building a High Wage America Panel with Joe Biden and Kirsten Gillibrand: https://tcf.org/content/event/building-high-wage-america-lessons-heartland/
  • Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute Virtual Series on the Socio-Economic Impacts of Covid-19 with Reps. Linda Sanchez and Ruben Gallego: https://chci.org/event/virtual-briefing-seriesGoer