Dr. Adriana Kugler, a professor of public policy and economics at Georgetown University's McCourt School of Public Policy, has been named the recipient of the 2025 Academic Achievement Award from the American Society of Hispanic Economists. The honor recognizes a sustained record of research that has shaped economists' understanding of labor markets, trade, and the economics of immigration and places her among a select group of scholars singled out by the society for significant contributions to the field.
According to the McCourt School of Public Policy, the award recognizes individuals who make significant contributions to economics and whose research advances the goals of the American Society of Hispanic Economists. For Kugler, it caps a career that has moved fluidly between rigorous academic scholarship and senior public service, and that has consistently returned to questions of how economic policy affects workers, including Latino workers and immigrant communities.
A Career Built on Labor Market Research
Kugler has devoted her career to advancing understanding of labor market and trade policies and their impacts on inequities in employment and earnings. Her scholarship examines how policies shape who works, what they earn, and how opportunity is distributed across the economy, with particular attention to the effects on Latino workers. A second major strand of her research investigates the economic impacts of immigration and the assimilation of immigrants in areas such as health and education.
That work has been published in leading economics journals and widely cited in both the academic literature and the media. Her standing in the profession is reflected in her affiliations: she is a research associate at the National Bureau of Economic Research and a research fellow at both the Centre for Economic Policy Research and the Stanford Center for Poverty and Inequality. These research networks are home to active, influential empirical economists, and her long association with them signals the durability of her research contributions.
Kugler earned her Ph.D. in economics from the University of California, Berkeley, and a joint bachelor's degree in economics and political science from McGill University. A fuller overview of her research portfolio is available through her Hamilton Project profile and her Georgetown faculty page.
In Her Own Words
In the announcement of the award, Kugler expressed both gratitude and a forward-looking commitment to the work that earned her the recognition.
"I am honored and thrilled to receive the 2025 Academic Achievement Award from ASHE, of the American Economic Association. I look forward to continuing to do rigorous and meaningful work that addresses both the economic contributions and challenges of Hispanics."
The statement captures something central to her academic identity. The award is not only a recognition of past scholarship but an affirmation of a research agenda she intends to continue, one focused on producing rigorous evidence about the economic realities facing Hispanic communities in the United States.
About the ASHE Academic Achievement Award
The American Society of Hispanic Economists is a professional association affiliated with the American Economic Association, dedicated to promoting the representation of Hispanic Americans in the economics profession and to advancing research on issues affecting Hispanic communities. According to the society's description of the award, the Academic Achievement Award was inaugurated in 2008 and is given to a member who, in the judgment of the selection committee, has made a significant contribution to economic research in line with the society's goals.
The award is issued every other year, alternating with the society's teaching award, which makes each selection relatively rare. The society's list of past recipients situates Kugler among a distinguished group of scholars recognized in prior cycles. She was formally recognized at the ASHE Business Meeting during the 2026 American Economic Association annual conference in Philadelphia.
Scholarship Alongside Public Service
What distinguishes Kugler's record is the degree to which her academic expertise has been carried directly into the highest levels of economic policymaking. In addition to her scholarly contributions, she has served in three senior federal policy roles, two of them Senate-confirmed. She is the first Hispanic to serve as a Governor of the Federal Reserve Board, the first Hispanic to serve as U.S. Executive Director at the World Bank, and the first Hispanic to serve as Chief Economist at the U.S. Department of Labor.
Each of these roles drew on the same labor-market expertise that defines her research. As U.S. Executive Director at the World Bank, she worked on labor questions in the context of global economic development, including the recovery from learning losses after the pandemic, job creation for young people, and increasing productivity in the agricultural sector. As Chief Economist at the Department of Labor, she contributed to national employment policy, including unemployment insurance, workforce development programs, minimum wages, and overtime pay. And as a member of the Federal Reserve Board, she brought a labor economist's perspective to monetary policy decisions that bear directly on the dual mandate of stable prices and maximum employment. The throughline across all of these positions is a scholar applying empirical research to consequential public decisions.
Her institutional leadership extends into the profession itself. She served as chair and chair-elect of the Business and Economics section of the American Statistical Association in 2019 and 2020, and between 2013 and 2016, she was Georgetown University's vice provost for faculty, a senior administrative role overseeing faculty affairs across the university.
A Record of Recognition
The ASHE award joins a series of honors that span the breadth of Kugler's career. In 2007, she received the John T. Dunlop Outstanding Scholar Award from the Labor and Employment Relations Association in recognition of her research contributions to the field. In 2010, one of her papers was awarded first prize for best contribution in the area of Globalization, Regulations, and Development from the Global Development Network.
More recently, she was named among Barron's 100 Most Influential Women in U.S. Finance in both 2024 and 2025, and listed among Bloomberg Linea's Top 500 Most Influential People of Latin America in 2023. She also received the Chase Award from the U.S. Department of the Treasury for her leadership and contributions to the Multilateral Development Banks' Evolution. Taken together, these recognitions reflect a scholar whose influence reaches across academic economics, international development, and monetary policy.
Why the Recognition Matters
For the economics profession, the award carries significance beyond any single scholar. The American Society of Hispanic Economists exists in part to strengthen the representation of Hispanic economists and to elevate research on the economic circumstances of Hispanic communities. Recognizing a scholar of Kugler's standing advances both aims at once, affirming the importance of the research and offering a visible example to students and early-career economists considering the field.
For Georgetown and the McCourt School, the honor reinforces the institution's position as a home for faculty whose work bridges scholarship and public policy. Kugler returned to her tenured professorship at Georgetown in the fall of 2025, and her continued presence on the faculty connects students directly to a researcher whose expertise has informed policy at the Federal Reserve, the World Bank, and the Department of Labor. Her recent Whittington Lecture at the McCourt School, which addressed the post-pandemic run-up in inflation and the lessons it carried for monetary policy, offered students and the public a direct window into her expertise.
As Kugler returns her full attention to research and teaching, the 2025 ASHE Academic Achievement Award stands as both a recognition of what she has already contributed and an endorsement of the work still ahead. It honors a career defined by rigorous evidence applied to questions that matter and by a scholar who has consistently used the tools of economics to illuminate the circumstances of the workers and communities at the center of her research.
Draft prepared for editorial submission. Sources: McCourt School of Public Policy and the American Society of Hispanic Economists. Subject to client approval prior to placement.
