The Future Direction of China’s Economy

Jeffrey D. Sachs is a world-renowned professor of economics, leader in sustainable development, senior UN advisor, bestselling author, and syndicated columnist whose monthly newspaper columns appear in more than 100 countries. He is the co-recipient of the 2015 Blue Planet Prize, the leading global prize for environmental leadership, and has twice been named among Time Magazine’s 100 most influential world leaders.

Yasheng Huang is the Epoch Foundation Professor of International Management and Faculty Director of Action Learning at the MIT Sloan School of Management. Between 2013 and 2017, he served as an Associate Dean in charge of MIT Sloan’s global partnership programs and its action learning initiatives. His previous appointments include faculty positions at the University of Michigan and at Harvard Business School. At MIT Sloan, Huang founded and directs China Lab and India Lab, which have provided low-cost consulting services to more than 360 small and medium enterprises in China and India. Between 2015 and 2018, he ran a program in Yunnan province to train women entrepreneurs (funded by Goldman Sachs Foundation). He has held or received prestigious fellowships, such as the National Fellowship at Stanford University and the Social Science Research Council-MacArthur Fellowship.

Paul Sheard was Research Fellow at the Mossavar-Rahmani Center for Business and Government at Harvard Kennedy School. Previously, he was Vice Chairman of S&P Global, after serving as Executive Vice President and Chief Economist. Earlier, he held chief economist positions at Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services, Nomura Securities and Lehman Brothers, and was Head of Japan Equity Investments at Baring Asset Management. Sheard was on the faculty of the Australian National University (ANU) and of Osaka University, and was a visiting assistant professor at Stanford University and foreign visiting scholar at the Bank of Japan.

Tao Wang is the author of “Making Sense of China’s Economy” and currently head of Asia Economic Research at UBS investment bank. She is an invited fellow of the China Finance (CF) 40 Forum and a member of the China Global Economic Governance 50 Forum.

Dr. Wang’s research on China covers a wide range of topics including monetary policy, the debt problem, shadow banking, local government finance, US-China trade disputes, supply chain shifts, RMB internationalization, the property bubble, the demographic challenge, the urban-rural divide, and the long-term growth potential. Dr. Wang has been consistently ranked as one of the top China economists by institutional investors. She writes a column for Caixin, and her views have been widely quoted by international and Chinese media.

Prior to joining UBS, Dr. Wang worked as Head of Asian Economics at BP plc. Before joining the private sector, Dr. Wang worked at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for over eight years, including on the China desk. She received her Ph.D. in Economics from New York University and her bachelor’s degree from Renmin University in Beijing.

Susan Yuqing Feng joined China Institute as Director of Programs in October.  Before joining CI, Susan was the Editor in Chief of Bitpush News, a leading block chain media based in New York and a columnist for the Financial Times Chinese Edition.

Throughout her journalism career, Susan conducted interviews with a multitude of world economic and political leaders, including Warren Buffet, Alan Greenspan, Paul Volker, President Clinton, Zbigniew Brzeziński, Michael Bloomberg, Thomas Friedman, and many more.  Susan has also directed the documentary series “World Movers” which was released in March 2018. It illustrated the emerging new world order 70 years after WWII, shedding light on what has changed the U.S. and the world and the forces affecting everyone. It focused on the relationships between technology and globalization, the impact on immigration, and the future of U.S.-China relations.