Background
Yi Gang was born in 1958, Beijing, China, China.
纲 易
Yi Gang was born in 1958, Beijing, China, China.
Yi grew up in Beijing, and studied economics in the Political Economy Department of Peking University from 1978–80, earning a BA in economics. He then traveled to St Paul, Minnesota, USA, to study at Hamline University where he earned a BA in management. Yi continued his studies at the University of Illinois, Champaign-Urbana, earning both an MA and PhD in economics between 1982–86.
After his graduation, Yi joined the faculty at Indiana University, Indianapolis in 1986 as a visiting assistant professor for a year. In 1987 he joined the faculty full-time as an assistant professor of economics and taught and researched there until 1994, receiving the rank of tenured associate professor. Dr Yi has been president of the Chinese Students and Scholars Association at the University of Illinois and president of the Chinese Economists Society in the USA.
In 1993, Yi initiated a conference on the theory and practice of China’s transition to a market economy with the Hainan Research Institute of Reform and Development of China and the Chinese Economics Association (UK). Since good economists were in high demand in government, industry, and universities across China, in late 1994 he returned to Peking University, this time as professor and PhD adviser in economics. Along with his professorial duties, Yi became deputy director of the China Center for Economic Research (CCER) of Peking University. In order to foster economic reform and development in China, the CCER was founded in 1994 with the aim of institutionalizing new teaching and research models at Peking University through the employment of Chinese economists, many of whom had received rigorous academic training outside China.
His formal banking career started in 1997 when he was selected as deputy secretary general of the Monetary Policy Committee of the People’s Bank of China. In 2002 he was named deputy director general of the Monetary Policy Department, during a deflationary period (1997–2003) that he had predicted, while continuing his duties with the Monetary Policy Committee. In 2004 he assumed the duties of director general, Monetary Policy Department of PBC. He continued in this role until December of 2007 when he was named as deputy governor of the People’s Bank of China.
Dr Yi has been an active scholar, publishing more than 40 articles in Chinese and 20 academic papers in English in such prestigious economics journals as the Journal of Econometrics, the China Economic Review, International Economics, Money and Banking, and Comparative Economic Studies. He is the author of ten books on economics and has served as a consultant for the Scandinavian Journal of Statistics, Comparative Economic Studies, Contemporary Policy Issues, and the Journal of Asian Economics. His research interests focus on econometrics and the banking and financial markets of China.