From tenured professor at Harvard to IMF chief economist, Gita Gopinath's journey to the top

International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief economist Gita Gopinath is on the list of 34 immigrants honoured by Carnegie Corporation of New York in recognition of having "enriched and strengthened" the US society and democracy. The Great Immigrants initiative is intended to increase public awareness on the role of immigrants in the United States.
In Gopinath's profile, Carnegie noted that she is "one of the world’s outstanding economists" and focuses her research on international finance and macroeconomics. A highlight in her journey as an economist was when, more than a decade ago, Gopinath, then just 38, was named tenured professor at Harvard University’s high-brow economics department and, thus, became the fourth woman ever and the first Indian-university educated faculty after Nobel laureate Amartya Sen to receive such an honour.
The 49-year-old had completed her bachelors in economics from Delhi’s Lady Shri Ram College and her masters from Delhi School of Economics before moving to the US for a PhD and considers herself a product of the Indian education system. "When I was doing my bachelors from Delhi University, India experienced its first major external financing and currency crisis in 1990-91. This inspired me to pursue graduate work in economics and was the foundation for my interest in international finance," she had told this writer in an interview in 2010, after she became a Harvard professor.
In a tweet, Gopinath remembers this as one of her first interviews.

She has since been widely published in top economics journals and has received numerous honours, including being elected as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2019, she was awarded the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman -- the highest honour the Indian government gives to overseas Indians and persons of Indian origin.
Back in 2010, Gopinath’s ground-breaking research in the area of international macroeconomics and finance -- areas that had become significant in the light of the global economic crisis of 2008 -- had earned recognition, respect and helped economists get a better understanding of the situation.
"She has made fundamental contributions to the understanding of sovereign debt defaults, which is the current leg of the crisis in Europe. Her work also shows, at a very deep level, why many emerging markets tend to experience greater macroeconomic volatility than advanced economies and has significantly advanced understanding of the interaction between prices and interest rates," Kenneth Rogoff, a professor of economics and public policy at Harvard and former chief economist at the IMF, had then said about Gopinath.
Today, there’s a sense of déjà vu when, as chief economist at the IMF herself, Gopinath is quoted as saying in her profile in Carnegie: "It’s exactly what the world is worried about: recession, jobs, inequality. It’s so clear to people these are important issues. And given my science background, I like that I’m bringing in some mathematical rigour … to understand these issues of the day."
The fact that there were very few women faculty at the top in US universities was a cause for concern to Gopinath back then too. She had felt that mentorship from seniors was as an important tool in breaking the gender glass ceiling at Ivy League universities in the US. "Junior women could benefit from having senior women as mentors, so when that pool is very small this is just harder to accomplish. In academia, the whole tenure clock makes having a family difficult, so this is a bigger challenge for women."