Jean Lee is a Senior Economist in the Office of the Chief Economist for the Africa Region at the World Bank. She previously served as a Senior Economist in the Office of the Chief Economist for the South Asia Region. She received a doctorate in economics from Harvard University in 2010 and a bachelor’s degree in physics from Harvard University in 2003.

In her current role, her work program centers on the private sector, firms, and jobs in Africa, with additional interests in the role of technology and innovation and gender. Previously, with the World Bank’s South Asia Chief Economist office, she researched digital technologies and their interactions with labor markets and gender. Prior to joining the World Bank, she led economic analysis for a portfolio of projects of over $800 million in grant finance for international development at a bipartisan independent federal agency, the Millennium Challenge Corporation, as an Associate Director and Economist.

During the COVID pandemic, she played a key role in the proposal and development of significant financing for COVID vaccines as Co-Lead Sherpa for the World Bank to the international community for COVID vaccine finance, based on her research, advising the World Bank Group as well as the United States government.

Her work has been published in leading social science journals including Science, the American Economic Review, the American Economic Review Papers and Proceedings issue, the American Economic Journal: Applied Economics, the American Law and Economics Review, the Journal of Public Economics, Health Economics, the Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, the Journal of International Trade and Economic Development, and the Review of Development Economics. She has work and research experience in Kenya, Zambia, Bangladesh, Uganda, Vietnam, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malawi and Burkina Faso and has led field work in India and Pakistan.