Name: Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics 2026 - Jobs for the Next Generation
Start: 2026-06-16T09:00:00.000-04:00
End: 2026-06-17T18:00:00.000-04:00

The World Bank Group’s Annual Conference on Development Economics—ABCDE—is a 37-year-old forum to stimulate an exchange of ideas between leaders in global policy discussions and researchers, policymakers, and development practitioners from the Bank’s member countries. Established in 1989 and organized by the World Bank’s Development Economics Vice Presidency (DEC), ABCDE became the premier venue for cutting-edge insights on how to tackle the most pressing challenges of development. Several younger researchers presenting papers went on to become Nobel Prize winners. The conference also played a role in shaping the global consensus on development policy.

A historic demographic tide is rising across the developing world—and it could define the global economy for generations to come. Over the next 25 years, countries across Sub-Saharan Africa, South Asia, and the Middle East—will see an unprecedented surge in their working-age population. Never before have so many people entered the labor force in such a short span of time.

This wave of workers could become one of the great economic opportunities of the 21^st century. With the right policies, it could unlock faster growth, greater innovation, and higher living standards across wide swaths of the world. By the same token, failure to seize the opportunity could fuel social unrest and instability that will inevitably transcend national borders. The difference hinges on a single word: jobs. If economies can generate them in abundance, the world will gain its much-needed demographic dividend.

ABCDE 2026, titled “Jobs for the Next Generation,” will confront the global jobs challenge head-on. The conference—scheduled for June 16–17, 2026, is organized by the World Bank in partnership with Georgetown University. It will bring together some of the world’s leading economic thinkers, to examine what works, what does not, and what must change. It will explore how to accelerate growth that generates more and better jobs, how to equip workers with the skills needed for tomorrow’s labor markets, and how to dismantle structural barriers that keep millions locked out of economic opportunity.

All times listed below are in Eastern Time (ET)

Download the Conference Agenda

Tuesday, June 16, 2026 Preston Auditorium, World Bank Headquarters
08:30 – 09:30	Registration and Breakfast
09:30 – 09:45	Opening Remarks Indermit S. Gill, Chief Economist of the World Bank Group and Senior Vice President for Development Economics
09:45 – 10:30	Keynote Address Daron Acemoglu, Institute Professor of Economics in the Department of Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
10:30 – 11:30	High-Level Panel on Jobs SPEAKERS Indermit S. Gill, Chief Economist of the World Bank Group and Senior Vice President for Development Economics Mohamad Al-Ississ, Senator, Former Minister of Finance to the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan Rania Al-Mashat, Former Minister of Planning, Economic Development and International Cooperation, Egypt MODERATOR: Lukwesa Burak, Presenter of BBC Inside Out
11:30 – 12:00	Coffee Break
12:00 – 13:30	Session 1: Facts about Job Dynamics SPEAKERS Gabriel Ulyssea, Associate Professor, Department of Economics at University College London Gaurav Chiplunkar, Assistant Professor of Business Administration at the University of Virginia Jonathan Morduch, Professor of Public Policy and Economics at the Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University MODERATOR: Aaditya Mattoo, Director, Development Research Group, World Bank
13:30 – 14:30	Lunch Break
14:30 – 15:30	Stanley Fischer Memorial Lecture: Public Debt and Central Banks David R. Malpass, Former President of the World Bank Group (2019 - 2023)
15:30 – 17:00	Session 2: The Worker and Firm Perspectives on What is Needed for Jobs SPEAKERS Achyuta Adhvaryu, Tata Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at the School of Global Policy and Strategy, The University of California, San Diego Kate Orkin, Associate Professor in Economics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government Supreet Kaur, Associate Professor, Department of Economics at UC Berkeley Todd Schoellman, Principal Research Economist, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis MODERATOR: Somik V. Lall, Director of Strategy in the Office of the World Bank Group Chief Economist

Wednesday, June 17, 2026 Fischer Colloquium, Georgetown University
08:30 – 09:30	Registration and Breakfast
09:30 – 10:00	Welcome and Opening Remarks Joel Hellman, Dean of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University
10:00– 11:00	Keynote Address Susan Athey, The Economics of Technology Professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business
11:00 – 11:30	Coffee Break
11:30 – 13:00	Session 3: Job Search and the Next Generation SPEAKERS Paper 1: Human-AI Interaction in Recruiting & Employment (Emma Wiles, Boston University) Paper 2: Using Digital Connectivity to Expand Global Job Opportunities for African Women (David McKenzie, World Bank & Heesung Kim, University of Michigan) MODERATOR: Rajesh Veeraraghavan, Associate Professor of Science Technology and International Affairs (STIA) Program at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service
13:00 – 14:00	Lunch Break
14:00 – 15:00	ABCDE 2026 Book Talk After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People (Simon & Schuster 2025) SPEAKER: Dean Spears, Associate Professor, Department of Economics, University of Texas at Austin MODERATOR: Steven Radelet, Donald F. McHenry Chair in Global Human Development and Distinguished Professor of the Practice of Development at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service
15:00 – 16:30	Session 4: Jobs for The Next Generation in a Changing World SPEAKERS Paper 1: The Evolution of Age-friendly Jobs in a Rapidly Ageing Economy (Karen Eggleston, Stanford University) Paper 2: Job Creation and Innovation in Conflict Zones (Charles Udomsaph, Georgetown University)
16:30 – 17:00	Closing Remarks

Keynote Speaker - Day 1

Daron Acemoglu

Daron Acemoglu is an Institute Professor at MIT, Faculty Co-Director of the James M. and Cathleen D. Stone Center on Inequality and Shaping the Future of Work, and a Research Affiliate at MIT's newly established Blueprint Labs. He is an elected fellow of the National Academy of Sciences, American Philosophical Society, the British Academy of Sciences, the Turkish Academy of Sciences, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Econometric Society, the European Economic Association, and the Society of Labor Economists. He is the author of six books, including New York Times bestseller Why Nations Fail: Power, Prosperity, and Poverty (joint with James A. Robinson), Introduction to Modern Economic Growth, The Narrow Corridor: States, Societies, and the Fate of Liberty (with James A. Robinson), and Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity (with Simon Johnson). His academic work covers a wide range of areas, including political economy, economic development, economic growth, technological change, inequality, labor economics and economics of networks.

Daron Acemoglu and MIT Sloan professor Simon Johnson, PhD ’89, as well as James A. Robinson from the University of Chicago, have won the 2024 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences.

Keynote Speaker - Day 2

Susan Athey

Susan Athey is The Economics of Technology Professor at Stanford Graduate School of Business. As one of the first “tech economists,” she served as consulting chief economist for Microsoft Corporation for six years, and has served on the boards of multiple private and public technology firms. She also served as a long-term advisor to the British Columbia Ministry of Forests, helping to architect and implement their auction-based pricing system. She was a founding associate director of the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, where she currently serves as senior fellow, and she is the founding director of the Golub Capital Social Impact Lab at Stanford GSB. Her current research focuses on the economics of digitization and the intersection of causal inference and artificial intelligence. She has worked on several application areas, including timber auctions, internet search, online advertising, the news media, labor market transitions, health, and digital technology for social impact. She received her bachelor’s degree from Duke University and her PhD from Stanford, and she holds an honorary doctorate from Duke University.

David R. Malpass

David R. Malpass was the 13th President of the World Bank Group.

During his tenure, Mr. Malpass focused on seeking stronger policies to increase economic growth, alleviate poverty, improve living standards, and reduce government debt burdens. Under his leadership, the Bank Group responded quickly to global crises, mobilizing a record $440 billion in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, war in Ukraine, sharp global economic slowdown, unsustainable debt burdens, climate change, and food, fertilizer, and energy shortages. The Bank Group also more than doubled its climate finance to developing countries during Mr. Malpass’s presidency, reaching a record $32 billion in FY22. Prior to his appointment at the World Bank Group, Mr. Malpass served as Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs for the United States. Mr. Malpass represented the United States in international settings, including the G-7 and G-20 Deputy Finance Ministerial, World Bank–IMF Spring and Annual Meetings, and meetings of the Financial Stability Board, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, and the Overseas Private Investment Corporation.

Indermit S. Gill

Indermit Gill is Chief Economist of the World Bank Group and Senior Vice President for Development Economics. Before starting this position on September 1, 2022, he served as the World Bank’s Vice President for Equitable Growth, Finance, and Institutions, where he helped shape the Bank’s response to the extraordinary series of shocks that have hit developing economies since 2020. Between 2016 and 2021, he was a professor of public policy at Duke University and non-resident senior fellow at the Brookings Institution’s Global Economy and Development program. He led the World Bank's influential 2009 World Development Report on economic geography. His work includes introducing the concept of the “middle-income trap” to describe how countries stagnate after reaching a certain level of income. The 2024 World Development Report, prepared with his guidance, highlights strategies for countries to escape the middle-income trap—by adopting modern technologies and driving innovation.

Mohamad Al-Ississ

Mohamad Al-Ississ is a current Senator in Jordan and Professor at Harvard, bringing together distinguished careers in both public service and academia. He has held several of Jordan's most senior economic and development roles, serving as Minister of Finance, Minister of Planning and International Cooperation, and State Minister for Economic Affairs for the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Prior to these ministerial positions, he served as Special Adviser to His Majesty King Abdullah II, Advisor to His Majesty for Economic Affairs, and Director of Economic and Social Development in the Office of His Majesty at the Royal Hashemite Court. His academic career is equally distinguished — from 2010 to 2016, he served as Assistant Professor and Associate Dean at the American University in Cairo and as a Visiting Lecturer at Harvard Kennedy School. He is also the Founding Professor of the first massive Arabic online course at Edraak, an e-learning platform developed in partnership with Harvard University and MIT through the EdX platform.

Rania Al-Mashat

Rania A. Al-Mashat has been a member of Egypt's cabinet of ministers since 2018, having served as Minister of Planning, Economic Development and International Cooperation, Minister of International Cooperation, and Minister of Tourism. Prior to her ministerial career, she held senior roles at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in Washington, D.C., where she served as Advisor to the Chief Economist and Senior Economist. She also held a distinguished tenure at the Central Bank of Egypt (CBE), where she played a pivotal role in modernizing the institution's monetary policy strategy, contributing to the formal adoption of an inflation-targeting regime — a cornerstone of the banking sector reform program launched in 2004. In that capacity, she was instrumental in the country's macroeconomic management, leading the design and continuous update of the macroeconomic framework in coordination with other ministries and government entities, and serving as the CBE's liaison with the IMF and Sovereign Rating Agencies.

Lukwesa Burak Moderator

Lukwesa Burak is a broadcast journalist and presenter who, in August 2016, became the main presenter of BBC Inside Out in the East Midlands. She began her media career at BBC Television Centre in London as a Broadcast Assistant in the Weather Centre, learning the craft of television journalism alongside renowned presenters such as Michael Fish and Bill Giles. Her television break came in Nottingham as a weather presenter on BBC East Midlands Today, where she also presented news bulletins, prompting a transition into news reporting. Lukwesa went on to anchor World News at Sky News for a decade and worked with Al Jazeera English in Doha, as well as eNCA in South Africa, experiences that broadened her perspective on global affairs. She studied Geography and French at the University of Sussex and completed a Master’s degree at the University of Leicester, developing a deep interest in geography and weather shaped by her early life in Africa.

Gabriel Ulyssea

Gabriel Ulyssea is an Associate Professor and Director of the PhD Program in the Department of Economics at University College London. He is a Research Fellow at the Institute for Fiscal Studies and IZA, and a Research Affiliate at CEPR and BREAD. He received his Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Chicago. His research spans economic development and labor economics, with a current focus on informality, migration, and the role of firms in economic development.

Gaurav Chiplunkar

Gaurav Chiplunkar is an Assistant Professor in the Global Economies and Markets group at the Darden School of Business, University of Virginia, where he joined in the fall of 2019. His research sits at the intersection of development and labor economics, examining how large industrial policies shape firm behavior and how frictions in labor markets constrain job search, recruitment, and hiring practices for both workers and firms. He also investigates how policy reforms and new technologies can help mitigate these frictions, with a broader focus on how labor market frictions, gender disparities, and digitalization shape economic outcomes in low- and middle-income countries.

Jonathan Morduch

Jonathan Morduch is Professor of Public Policy and Economics at the Wagner Graduate School of Public Service at New York University. Morduch's research focuses on finance, poverty, and inequality. He is a founder and Executive Director of the NYU Financial Access Initiative. Morduch is the author with Rachel Schneider of The Financial Diaries: How American Families Cope in a World of Uncertainty (Princeton 2017; project site) and co-author of Portfolios of the Poor: How the World’s Poor Live on $2 a Day (Princeton 2009) and The Economics of Microfinance (MIT Press 2010). He is co-editor of Banking the World: Empirical Foundations of Financial Inclusion (MIT Press). Together with Dean Karlan, Morduch is the author of Economics (McGraw-Hill 2024), an empirically-oriented principles of economics text now in its 4th edition.

Aaditya Mattoo Moderator

Aaditya Mattoo is Director of the Development Research Group of the World Bank. He specializes in development, trade, and international cooperation, and provides policy advice to governments. Previously, he served as Chief Economist of the East Asia and Pacific Region. He was also Co-Director of the World Development Report 2020 on Global Value Chains and Research Manager, Trade and Integration. Before he joined the Bank, Mr. Mattoo was Economic Counsellor at the World Trade Organization and taught economics at the University of Sussex and Churchill College, Cambridge University. He holds a Ph.D. in Economics from the University of Cambridge, and an M.Phil in Economics from the University of Oxford. He has published on development, trade, trade in services, and international trade agreements in academic and other journals and his work has been cited in the Economist, Financial Times, New York Times, and Time Magazine.

Achyuta Adhvaryu

Achyuta Adhvaryu is the Tata Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at the School of Global Policy and Strategy and the inaugural director of the 21st Century India Center at the University of California, San Diego. He is also the co-founder of Good Business Lab, a global nonprofit dedicated to improving the well-being of low-income workers. Adhvaryu’s research portfolio spans the fields of development economics, organizational economics, labor economics and health economics. He has a Ph.D. in economics from Yale University, and prior to joining UC San Diego he held faculty appointments at the University of Michigan and Yale.

Kate Orkin

Kate Orkin is Associate Professor in Economics and Public Policy at the Blavatnik School of Government. Kate completed her undergraduate degree at the University of Cape Town. She did her MPhil and DPhil at Oxford as a Rhodes Scholar, finishing in 2015. Kate is an applied microeconomist, working in labour, public, development and behavioural economics. She mainly runs large field experiments in Kenya, Ethiopia, Uganda and South Africa, developing and testing real-world interventions in partnership with governments and NGOs. Her research studies frictions in urban developing country labour markets that prevent young people from finding work; the role of mental health in labour market decisions; the design of cash transfer and wage subsidy programmes; and the role of aspirations in economic decision-making.

Supreet Kaur

Supreet Kaur is an Associate Professor (with tenure) in the Department of Economics at UC Berkeley, specializing in development economics with significant overlap in behavioral and labor economics. Her research pursues two interconnected strands. The first focuses on the functioning of labor markets in developing countries, documenting frictions, studying the causes of unemployment, and examining the impact of inequality on labor productivity. The second explores how psychological forces — such as the limits of human cognition and social norms — affect individual behavior and market equilibria. By applying insights from psychology to economics, her work aims to deepen our understanding of the causes and consequences of poverty.

Todd Schoellman

Todd Schoellman is a Senior Research Economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, a position he has held since 2018. Prior to this role, he served as a Senior Scholar with the Opportunity and Inclusive Growth Institute and held faculty positions as an Assistant Professor of Economics at both Clemson University and Arizona State University. He earned his B.S. in Economics from Ohio State University and his Ph.D. in Economics from Stanford University. His research has been published in leading academic journals, including the Review of Economic Studies, the Journal of Political Economy, and the Quarterly Journal of Economics.

Somik V. Lall Moderator

Somik V. Lall is Director of Strategy in the Office of the World Bank Group Chief Economist. Lall has held various leadership positions across the World Bank Group including Senior Adviser to the World Bank Group Chief Economist, Director of the 2024 World Development Report on the Middle-Income Trap, Acting Director of DEC Development Policy, Head of the Climate Economics Team, and Global Lead in the Sustainable Development and Infrastructure Vice Presidencies. Lall has directed the World Bank's 2024 World Development Report on the “Middle Income Trap”(opens in a new tab) that examines how middle-income countries can break into the ranks of the wealthiest economies. He is also a co-founder of the Growth Academy, a joint initiative between the World Bank and the University of Chicago to advance joint research programs on economic growth with think tanks in emerging economies.

Joel Hellman

Joel Hellman serves as Dean of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, a role he has held since July 2015, bringing with him over 25 years of experience working on some of the most complex issues of governance, conflict, and the political economy of development. Prior to joining Georgetown, he served as the World Bank's first Chief Institutional Economist and previously directed the World Bank's Fragile and Conflict Affected States Division. His broader career at the World Bank spanned several additional senior roles, including Director of the Center for Conflict, Security and Development in Nairobi, Kenya — where he led the Bank's engagement with fragile and conflict-affected states worldwide — and Coordinator of the Bank's response to the devastating Asian Tsunami in Indonesia. As a development practitioner, Dean Hellman has worked in nearly 50 countries across four continents. He also served as Senior Political Counselor at the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development in London. As a scholar, Dr. Hellman has held faculty positions in political science at Harvard University and Columbia University, with a focus on the politics of economic reform.

Emma Wiles

Emma Wiles is the Isabel Anderson Career Development Professor and Assistant Professor of Information Systems at Boston University's Questrom School of Business. She is also a Digital Fellow at the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy and a Faculty Fellow at BU's Digital Business Institute. Her research focuses on the application of artificial intelligence in labor markets and the design of online platforms. Her work has been published in leading academic journals including Management Science, the Journal of Public Economics, and the American Economic Journal: Economic Policy. Emma received her Ph.D. from MIT Sloan in 2024. Her dissertation, "Artificial Intelligence and Labor Market Matching," was awarded the University of Padua's International PhD Thesis Award in Artificial Intelligence in Entrepreneurship and Management (AIEM).

David McKenzie

David McKenzie is a Lead Economist in the Development Research Group, Prosperity Research Program. He received his B.Com.(Hons)/B.A. from the University of Auckland, New Zealand and his Ph.D. in Economics from Yale University. Prior to joining the World Bank, he spent four years as an assistant professor of Economics at Stanford University. His main research is on migration, enterprise development, and methodology for use with developing country data. He has published more than 150 articles in journals such as the Quarterly Journal of Economics, American Economic Review, Review of Economic Studies, Journal of Political Economy, Science, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of the European Economic Association, Economic Journal, American Economic Journal: Applied Micro, Journal of Econometrics, and all leading development journals. He is currently on the editorial boards of the Journal of Development Economics, the World Bank Economic Review, and Migration Studies. He is also a co-founder and regular contributor to the Development Impact blog.

Heesung Kim

Heesung Kim is a PhD candidate in Economics at the University of Michigan. Prior to joining the PhD program, he worked at the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis. His research lies at the intersection of labor and development economics, with an emphasis on market and behavioral frictions shaping job search, hiring, and worker decision-making.

Rajesh Veeraraghavan Moderator

Rajesh Veeraraghavan is an Associate Professor of Science Technology and International Affairs (STIA) Program at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service. He was a postdoctoral fellow at the Watson Institute of International and Public Affairs at Brown University and was previously a Fellow at the Berkman Center at Harvard University. He works in the intersection of information technology, development, and governance, with a focus on India. Previously, he was an associate researcher at the Technology for Emerging Markets group at Microsoft Research, India. His work led to several research publications, patents as well as non-profit spin-off called Digital Green on whose board he serves currently. Before that, he worked as a software developer at Microsoft for several years in the US. He has a Ph.D. from University of California, Berkeley’s School of Information, a Master’s degree in Computer Science from Clemson University, Master’s degree in Economics from Cleveland State University, and Bachelor’s degrees in Economics and Management from Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani, India.

After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People

Dean Spears

Dean Spears is Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Texas at Austin, where he is also an affiliate of the Population Research Center, the South Asia Institute, and Innovations for Peace and Development. An economic demographer and development economist, his research spans child health, growth, and survival — with a particular focus on India — as well as the environment, air pollution, climate change, and the population dimensions of social well-being. Beyond UT-Austin, he is a founding Executive Director of r.i.c.e. (Research Institute for Compassionate Economics) and has served as a Visiting Economist at the Economics and Planning Unit of the Indian Statistical Institute in Delhi. He is further affiliated with IZA and the Climate Futures Initiative at Princeton University. He is the co-author of After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People — a compelling examination of what it means for humanity's future if the defining challenge is not too many people on a crowded planet, but too few to sustain the progress the world needs.

Steven Radelet Moderator

Steven Radelet holds the Donald F. McHenry Chair in Global Human Development and is Distinguished Professor of the Practice of Development at Georgetown University’s Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service. He served as the Director of the Master of Global Human Development Program at SFS from 2014 to 2025. His work focuses on economic growth, foreign aid, debt, and financial crises, primarily in Africa and Asia. Professor Radelet joined the Georgetown faculty in 2012 after serving as Chief Economist of USAID and Senior Adviser for Development for Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. He previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Treasury (1999-2002). He served as an economic advisor to President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf of Liberia from 2006-2009 and again from 2013-2017, and also was an advisor to President Joyce Banda of Malawi. He spent twelve years with the Harvard Institute for International Development, while teaching in both the Harvard economics department and Kennedy School of Government. While with HIID, he spent four years as resident adviser to the Ministry of Finance in Jakarta, Indonesia, and two years with the Ministry of Finance and Trade in The Gambia. He holds Ph.D. and master's degrees in public policy from Harvard University and a bachelor's degree in mathematics from Central Michigan University.

Karen Eggleston

Karen Eggleston is a Senior Fellow at the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) at Stanford University and Director of the Stanford Asia Health Policy Program at the Shorenstein Asia-Pacific Research Center at FSI. She is also a Fellow with the Center for Innovation in Global Health at Stanford University School of Medicine, and a Faculty Research Fellow of the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER). Her research focuses on government and market roles in the health sector and Asia health policy, especially in China, India, Japan, and Korea; healthcare productivity; and the economics of the demographic transition. Eggleston earned her PhD in public policy from Harvard University and has MA degrees in economics and Asian studies from the University of Hawaii and a BA in Asian studies summa cum laude (valedictorian) from Dartmouth College. Eggleston studied in China for two years and was a Fulbright scholar in Korea. She served on the Strategic Technical Advisory Committee for the Asia Pacific Observatory on Health Systems and Policies and has been a consultant to the World Bank, the Asian Development Bank, and the WHO regarding health system reforms in the PRC.

Charles Udomsaph

Charles Udomsaph is a Teaching Professor in the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University, where he teaches statistics and econometrics for the Global Human Development Program and leads a Stata practicum for undergraduates. Since 2003, he has served as a consultant for the World Bank, working on projects across Africa and the Middle East and North Africa regions. His experience spans enterprise survey implementation in Southeast Asia to capacity-building initiatives in Rwanda and Jordan. His current research develops a novel methodology to measure AI adoption internationally at scale and examines how conflict affects innovation and job creation in Africa and West Asia. Professor Udomsaph earned both his BSFS and MSFS degrees from Georgetown University and holds a PhD in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley.

Kenan Karakülah

Kenan Karakülah is a Senior Economist and Special Assistant to the Vice President at the World Bank's Development Economics Vice Presidency (DECVP). Since 2024, he has served as Chair of the organizing committee for the Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics (ABCDE). His research spans key areas of macroeconomic policy, with a focus on economic growth, social protection, and sovereign debt. Before joining the World Bank, Kenan served as Head of Department at the Ministry of Treasury and Finance, bringing firsthand experience in economic policymaking at the national level. Kenan holds a Ph.D. in Economics from Hacettepe University, Türkiye, and a Master of International Development Policy from Duke University.

Program Committee

David McKenzie

David McKenzie is a Lead Economist in the Development Research Group, Finance and Private Sector Development Unit. He received his B.Com.(Hons)/B.A. from the University of Auckland, New Zealand and his Ph.D. in Economics from Yale University. Prior to joining the World Bank, he spent four years as an assistant professor of Economics at Stanford University. His main research is on migration, enterprise development, and methodology for use with developing country data. He is also a co-founder and regular contributor to the Development Impact blog.

Joe Rebello

Joe Rebello is the World Bank’s External Affairs Lead for Development Economics. In this capacity, he advises the World Bank Group’s Chief Economist on external engagement and media relations. He also plays a key role in message development and external outreach on several flagship publications—including the World Development Report, Global Economic Prospects, and Women, Business, and the Law. He was previously a senior communications officer for the International Finance Corporation, where he advised senior management in crafting IFC’s highest-priority internal and external communications. Before joining the World Bank Group in 2008, he was a business journalist for 20 years, writing about US and international economic policy, debt distress, and banking for The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones Newswires, and The Kansas City Star.

Indu Kilaru

Indu Kilaru is a Consultant, specializing in energy transition, climate-smart infrastructure, and operations. In the Development Economics Vice Presidency (DEC), she contributes to research on private capital mobilization for low- and middle-income countries while supporting communication and digital strategy for high-level events. Prior to her role in DEC, Indu worked as a Consultant in South Asia’s Infrastructure (ISARF) team. She served as a core technical member for energy-efficiency initiatives, streamlined portfolio monitoring, and integrated climate co-benefits into regional operations. Before joining the World Bank, she worked as Research Specialist, analyzing Electric Vehicle (EV) supply chain bottlenecks and the governance implications of automation. Her academic and professional excellence has been recognized with the Piore Prize for Best Paper in Science and Public Policy and the title of “Brightest Engineer of India” (2019). Indu holds a Master of Public Affairs from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Bachelor’s in Computer Science.

Sandi Soe Lwin

Sandi Soe Lwin serves is a Program Assistant for the Development Economic Strategy (DECST) unit at the World Bank, providing administrative and logistical support to the DECSI Director and the Development Economics Vice Presidency (DECVP) Front Office. She began her career at the World Bank in the Myanmar Country Office, later contributing to the World Development Report team and the Strategy, Risk, and Country Community (OPSRR) team before joining her current role. Sandi holds an MBA from Assumption University (ABAC) in Thailand, and a Diploma in International Relations and Economic Policy of Southeast Asia from the International Center of Excellence (ICOE) at Yangon University, in association with Johns Hopkins University.

Previous ABCDE Conferences

The Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics (ABCDE) is a well-known series of conferences that facilitate the discussion of new knowledge about development. First held in Washington DC in 1989, the series has become broader in scope as the world's economies have become more interconnected and challenges have grown more complex.

The 2025 Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics (ABCDE) on "Development in the Age of Populism", was held from July 22-25, 2025 in Washington, DC in-person and online. Populism, in short, is ascendant to an unusually synchronized degree, fueled by a fragmenting public consensus on the policies needed for economic progress. It will pose a formidable development challenge in the coming years.

Learn more about ABCDE 2025

The 2024 Annual Bank Conference on Development Economics (ABCDE) on "The Great Incoherence", was held from June 10-11, 2024 in Washington, DC in-person and online. A growing incoherence is clouding global debates over how to achieve the key development goals of the 2020s—a profound mismatch exists between international policy advocacy and the research-based solutions necessary to achieve the desired development outcomes.

Learn more about ABCDE 2024

Click here to learn more about past ABCDE Conferences

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Tuesday, June 16, 2026

Preston Auditorium, World Bank Headquarters

Registration and Breakfast

Opening Remarks

Keynote Address

High-Level Panel on Jobs

Coffee Break

Session 1: Facts about Job Dynamics

Lunch Break

Stanley Fischer Memorial Lecture: Public Debt and Central Banks

Session 2: The Worker and Firm Perspectives on What is Needed for Jobs

Wednesday, June 17, 2026

Fischer Colloquium, Georgetown University

Registration and Breakfast

Welcome and Opening Remarks

Keynote Address

Coffee Break

Session 3: Job Search and the Next Generation

Lunch Break

ABCDE 2026 Book Talk

After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People (Simon & Schuster 2025)

Session 4: Jobs for The Next Generation in a Changing World

Closing Remarks

Keynote Speaker - Day 1

Daron Acemoglu

Keynote Speaker - Day 2

Susan Athey

Stanley Fischer Memorial Lecture

David R. Malpass

High-Level Panel Speakers

Indermit S. Gill

Mohamad Al-Ississ

Rania Al-Mashat

Lukwesa Burak Moderator

Facts about Job Dynamics

Gabriel Ulyssea

Gaurav Chiplunkar

Jonathan Morduch

Aaditya Mattoo Moderator

The Worker and Firm Perspectives on What is Needed for Jobs

Achyuta Adhvaryu

Kate Orkin

Supreet Kaur

Todd Schoellman

Somik V. Lall Moderator

Day 2 - Opening Remarks

Joel Hellman

Job Search and the Next Generation

Emma Wiles

David McKenzie

Heesung Kim

Rajesh Veeraraghavan Moderator

ABCDE 2026 Book Talk

After the Spike: Population, Progress, and the Case for People

Dean Spears

Steven Radelet Moderator

Jobs for The Next Generation in a Changing World

Karen Eggleston

Charles Udomsaph

Organizing Committee Chair

Kenan Karakülah

Program Committee

David McKenzie

Joe Rebello

Indu Kilaru

Sandi Soe Lwin

Previous ABCDE Conferences

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