Cristián Larroulet, director of Libertad y Desarrollo (Liberty and Development), was recently chosen by 500 of his peers as 2009’s top economist in Chile [link in Spanish]. After finishing his education at Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and the University of Chicago, Larroulet served as chief of staff for Chilean Finance Minister Hernán Büchi (1985-89) where he was a key engineer of Chile’s economic reforms and a member of the National Commission for Privatization. In 2009, Larroulet was instrumental in forming center-right presidential candidate Sebastián Piñera’s platform for much needed education reform. Piñera received 44% of the vote in Sunday’s presidential elections and is favored for the country’s highest office. Run-off elections take place January 17.
Larroulet is known as ambitious and principled yet pragmatic. According to the Chilean daily, El Mercurio, he has been putting out fires between the left and right for years with a “conciliatory personality that allows him to build bridges.” “He belongs to the school in which his passion for execution is more important than his passion for theory,” explains Jorge Marshall of the center-left think tank Expansiva UDP. Nobel laureate Gary Becker, his professor at Chicago, notes that “although it was thirty years ago, I remember him as a good student … he is a very good economist, particularly at using economics to discuss important social issues.” Larroulet and company at Libertad y Desarrollo received Atlas’s 2009 Fisher Memorial Award for their book, Ideas to Overcome Poverty.
No comments have been made on this post.