Simeon Dyankov (, also Djankov; born July 13, 1970) is a Bulgarian economist and chairman of the Fiscal Council since March 2025. From 2009 to 2013, he was the deputy prime minister and minister of finance of Bulgaria in the government of Boyko Borisov.Simeon Djankov Heads the Finance Ministry July 27, 2009 He has been a vocal supporter of Bulgaria's entry into the Eurozone. Before his cabinet appointment, he was the chief economist of the finance and private sector vice-presidency of the World Bank.
At the World Bank, Dyankov was director for development policy and senior director in the office of the chief economist.Simeon Djankov's World Bank Positions April 17, 2021 Dyankov was involved in the publication of Women Business and the Law, World Development Reports and Doing Business reports.World Development Report 2019 Team worldbank.org, accessed January 31, 2023.– Doing Business Founders, November 10, 2017 The Doing Business reports were discontinued after an audit documented that Dyankov, along with then World Bank CEO Georgieva, pressured staff to make data for China and Saudi Arabia look better.
He was an associate editor of the Journal of Comparative Economics from 2004 to 2009. Dyankov was a chairman of the board of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development. From 2013 to 2015, he was appointed rector of the New Economic School in Moscow. Since November 2015, Dyankov has been director for policy of the Financial Markets Group at the London School of Economics.
Since April 2020, Dyankov has been policy director at the Financial Markets Group at the London School of Economics. He has also been a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics. He has written widely on the economic impact of the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine.The Loss of Human Capital in Ukraine, Noam Angrist, Simeon Djankov, Pinelopi Goldberg and Harry Patrinos, CEPR.ORG, 27 April 2022.
Early life Dyankov was born in Lovech, Bulgaria, on July 13, 1970. He attended Ekzarh Yosif I high school in Lovech (1984–1989). In 1989, he passed the entrance exam to the Karl Marx Institute of Economics (now University of National and World Economy). He holds a 1997 doctorate from the University of Michigan, on the topic "Three Essays on the Economics of Transition". His main thesis advisor was Alan Deardorff.
Academia Dyankov has published in journals such as American Economic Review, The Quarterly Journal of Economics, the Journal of Political Economy, The Journal of Finance and the Journal of Financial Economics. He co-edited the book The Resolution of Financial Distress with Stijn Claessens and Ashoka Mody.
Dyankov was one of the creators of the Human Capital Index, first published in the World Development Report 2019, which he co-directed. The academic study describing the index construction was published in the leading science journal Nature.–
Harvard Kennedy School After leaving the government of Boyko Borisov, Dyankov joined the Harvard Kennedy School as visiting faculty. His teaching is focused on the politics of development. At Harvard, Dyankov edited a special issue of the Journal of Comparative Economics on the 25th anniversary from the start of transition in Eastern Europe. Jointly with Anders Aslund at the Atlantic Council, he co-wrote a book on the transformation from communism. The book contains chapters by Leszek Balcerowicz on Poland, Václav Klaus on the Czech Republic, Lajos Bokros on Hungary, Ivan Mikloš on Slovakia and Mart Laar on Estonia.
New Economic School In October 2013, it was announced that the board of directors of the private Moscow-based university New Economic School (NES), also known as the Russian Economic School, had approved Dyankov as its rector. During his tenure as rector, the New Economic School moved to a new campus in the Skolkovo Innovation Center. Sergey Guriyev was the Rector at New Economic School (NES) until he resigned on 30 April 2013 and fled to France. In July 2014, Dyankov himself was put on a draft list under Russian foreign agent law and shortly resigned.
London School of Economics Dyankov is the policy director at the Financial Markets Group, responsible for a large research project on post-Covid recovery. The project shows that the pandemic caught governments in developing economies off guard, and that governments in Africa reacted in ways that pushed more people into the informal economy. In advanced economies the pandemic opened a larger gender gap in employment, while bankruptcies actually fell due to generous government support schemes, further expanding the inequality of opportunity between men and women.
His research is also on the rising income inequality in Russia, including due to autarky. The Russian economy looks inward, with imports down nearly 20% in 2022. Previous periods of autarkic policies in Russian and Soviet history have resulted in economic backwardness. Vladimir Putin's presidency has accelerated the rise of Russian oligarchs:"Closeness to Putin substitutes for the rule of law that usually protects private property in mature democracies. Such protection is mercurial, however. On occasion, billionaires fall out of favor and their assets are up for grabs."
His research on contagious protests, which draws on the Arab Spring events, is cited in numerous global newspapers. Another line of research investigates economic sanctions.
Think tanks In 2008, Dyankov established the think-tank Ideas42, jointly with Antoinette Schoar (MIT Sloan), Eldar Shafir (Princeton) and Sendhil Mullainathan (Harvard)."Handicapping the John Bates Clark Medal", The Wall Street Journal, April 12, 2012 Dyankov joined the Peterson Institute for International Economics in 2013 and re-joined it in 2020, working primarily on former socialist economies. In a 2016 lecture at the Kyiv School of Economics he argued that: "The one reform that is the most difficult to figure out how to do in Ukraine, is reducing the role of the oligarchs. Even after 25 of transition in a number of countries, including Russia and Ukraine, the oligarchs still control not just business life but also public life, which prevented major political and economic changes."
World Bank Dyankov has worked for the World Bank since 1995, initially focusing on privatization and enterprise restructuring."Enterprise Restructuring in Transition: A Quantitative Survey", Journal of Economic Literature. Published 4 September 2002. In 1997, he participated in a World Bank enterprise restructuring project in Georgia. For his work in the transformation of the Georgian economy, he was awarded an honorary doctorate from the Free University of Tbilisi in June 2021."Dr Simeon Djankov Awarded Doctoris Honoris Causa", Free University of Tbilisi, June 3, 2021 Dyankov also led World Bank projects on state-owned enterprise restructuring in Moldova."On the Determinants of Enterprise Adjustment: Evidence from Moldova", Journal of Transition Economics. Published 28 November 1997. This work restarted after Russia's invasion of Ukraine, under the aegis of the European Commission, with a state-owned enterprise strategy published in February 2023."State-Owned Enterprise Strategy 2023–2030", Official Gazette Monitorul Oficial Nr. 49-52 art. 88, (in Romanian). Published 17 February 2023. Dyankov led two World Bank projects in Ukraine and continues to be involved in proposals on financing the post-war recovery. These proposals involve large amounts of aid from Western donors as well as reparations by Russia. The priorities uniformly focus on rebuilding human capital and infrastructure."The cost of the Kakhovka Dam destruction", CEPR London, July 10, 2023
1997 Asian Financial Crisis Dyankov participated in several World Bank financial sector restructuring projects during the 1997 Asian financial crisis."Resolution of Financial Distress", World Bank Institute Book Series. Published 1 January 2001. Based on these projects, he published a series of articles on corporate governance in East Asia with Stijn Claessens."The separation of ownership and control in East Asian corporations", Journal of Financial Economics. Published 15 September 2001." Disentangling the incentive and entrenchment effects of large shareholdings ", Journal of Finance. Published 7 December 2002.
The World Development Report 2002 World Development Report 2002 analyzed how to build effective institutions. The study was guided by Joseph Stiglitz, with Simeon Djankov as a principal author. Several background papers, including by Nobel Prize winners Robert Shiller, Amartya Sen and Gabriel García Márquez, were published in academic journals or books.Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Courts", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2003, 118 (2): 453–517.I– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Regulation of Labor", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2004, 119 (4): 1339–1382– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Debt Enforcement Around the World", Journal of Political Economy, 2008, 116 (6): 1105–1150.– Djankov, Simeon, Caralee McLiesh, Tatiana Nenova and Andrei Shleifer, 2003. "Who Owns the Media?", Journal of Law and Economics, 46 (2): 341–381.– World Bank, "The Right to Tell: The Role of Mass Media in Economic Development", June 2002
The World Development Report 2019 The World Development Report 2019 was led by Djankov and Federica Saliola."World Development Report 2019 Team", World Bank. Retrieved February 2, 2023. A summary of the main arguments and data is provided in the Journal of International Affairs. Fears that robots will take jobs from people have dominated the discussion over the future of work, but the World Development Report 2019 finds that on balance this appears to be unfounded.
Doing Business report and scandal Dyankov is the creator of the annual Doing Business report, the top-selling publication of the World Bank Group. The report came out of joint research work with Professor Andrei Shleifer at Harvard University and was inspired by Dyankov's experience in overly-regulated socialist economies. In a 2016 article for the Journal of Economic Perspectives, Dyankov explains how Doing Business started and lists academic papers that serve as background research for the report.Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Courts", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2003, 118 (2): 453–517.I– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Regulation of Labor", Quarterly Journal of Economics, 2004, 119 (4): 1339–1382– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Debt Enforcement Around the World", Journal of Political Economy, 2008, 116 (6): 1105–1150.– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Private Credit in 129 Countries", Journal of Financial Economics, 2007, 12 (2): 77–99.– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "The Effect of Corporate Taxes on Investment and Entrepreneurship", American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, 2010, 2 (3): 31–64.– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Property Rights and Urban Form", The Journal of Law and Economics, 2022, 65 (S1).– Djankov, Simeon, et al., "Public Procurement in Law and Practice", American Economic Review, 2022, 112(4): 1091–1117.