Research Professor
CUNY Graduate Center
Branko Milanovic obtained his Ph.D. in economics (1987) from the University of Belgrade with a dissertation on income inequality in Yugoslavia. He served as lead economist in the World Bank’s Research Department for almost 20 years, leaving to write his book on global income inequality, Worlds Apart (2005). He was a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington (2003-2005) and has held teaching appointments at the University of Maryland (2007-2013) and at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University (1997- 2007). He was a visiting scholar at All Souls College in Oxford, and Universidad Carlos III in Madrid (2010-11).
Professor Milanovic’s main area of work is income inequality, in individual countries and globally, including in preindustrial societies. He has published articles in Economic Journal, Review of Economics and Statistics, Journal of Economic Literature, Journal of Development Economics, and Journal of Political Philosophy, among others. His book The Haves and the Have-nots (2011) was selected by The Globalist as the 2011 Book of the Year. Global Inequality (2016) was awarded the Bruno Kreisky Prize for the best political book of 2016 and the Hans Matthöfer Prize in 2018, and was translated into 16 languages. It addresses economic and political effects of globalization and introduces the concept of successive “Kuznets waves” of inequality. In March 2018, Milanovic was awarded (jointly with Mariana Mazzucato) the 2018 Leontief Prize for Advancing the Frontiers of Economic Knowledge. His most recent books are Capitalism, Alone, published in 2019, and Visions of Inequality, published in 2023..
Areas of Expertise
Global Inequality
Globalization
History of Inequality
Macroeconomy
Featured Work
Established in 2014, Professor Milanovic’s blog globalinequality covers topics from Marxism to capitalism, as well as many other issues affecting global inequality. He posts several times a month and attract visitors globally.
- The Great Escape—Health, Wealth, and InequalityIn this video, Angus Deaton traces the dramatic increase in human prosperity over the past 250 years as well as the widening gap between the poor and sick, and the rich and well.
- Panel: Income Inequality LIS Book LaunchIn this video, panelists and editors discuss “Income Inequality: Economic Disparities and the Middle Class in Affluent Countries” at its launch.
- Income Inequality Today: A Conversation with Branko Milanovic and Janet Gornick, Moderated by William P. KellyLIS Director Janet Gornick and World Bank economist Branko Milanovic participated in a discussion on income inequality with William Kelly, the Interim Chancellor of CUNY. The event took place at the Roosevelt Center at Hunter College (CUNY).