Karen Dynan is a Professor of the Practice in the Harvard University Department of Economics and at the Harvard Kennedy School. She is also a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. She previously served as Assistant Secretary for Economic Policy and Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of the Treasury from 2014 to 2017. From 2009 to 2013, Dynan was vice president and co-director of the Economic Studies program at the Brookings Institution.

Dynan is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research, where she chairs the Conference on Research in Income and Wealth. Her current activities also include chairing the American Economic Association Committee on Economic Statistics, serving on the Academic Advisory Committee of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and serving on the Smith Richardson Foundation Grants Advisory Committee. Past roles include being on the staff of the Federal Reserve Board (1992-2009), working as a senior economist at the White House Council of Economic Advisers (2003-2004), and serving as a visiting assistant professor at Johns Hopkins University (1998).

Dynan’s current research interests include monetary and fiscal policy, consumer behavior, and economic measurement. She received her Ph.D. in economics from Harvard University and her A.B. from Brown University.