Academy Fellow

David Gruen has contributed to economic public policy via his roles in the Reserve Bank of Australia (1989-2002), Australian Treasury (2003-2014), Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet (2014 – 2019) and the Australian Bureau of Statistics (2019 – 2024). 

He has contributed to applied economic research and economic policy in a range of areas including: monetary policy with a flexible inflation target, the efficient markets hypothesis, estimating the Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU) in Australia, setting macroeconomic policy with real-time GDP estimates, the contribution of compulsory superannuation to Australia’s national saving, macroeconomic management of a once-in-a-lifetime terms of trade boom, the macroeconomic response to the global financial crisis, modelling the economic cost of reducing greenhouse gas emissions, macroeconomic forecasting, the role of fiscal policy and the Australian fiscal policy framework, modelling in the Treasury’s Intergenerational Reports, technological change and the future of work, Australia’s role in the G20, and the role of data in public policy.

He was also Australia’s G20 Sherpa, 2015-2019 and, in response to the arrival of the COVID-19 pandemic in Australia, contributed to the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ rapid deployment of new household and business surveys and accessing new administrative data sources (e.g., Single Touch Payroll data from the Australian Tax Office) and new integrated data assets (e.g., linking the Australian Immunisation Register to the Multi-Agency Data Integrated Project (MADIP)) to enable new lines of research to be undertaken.

1980: Research Assistant, Physiological Laboratory, Cambridge University

1980–1984: Postdoctoral Fellow and Queen Elizabeth II Fellow, Department of Applied Mathematics, ANU

1989 –2002: Range of roles in Economic Research and Economic: Analysis Departments, Reserve Bank of Australia, including as Head, Economic Research Department, from May 1998 – December 2002

2003-2014: Range of roles in Macroeconomic Group, Australian Treasury; Executive Director from May 2008

2014- 2019: Deputy Secretary, Economic, and G20 Sherpa,

Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet

2019-current: Australian Statistician and Head of the Australian Bureau of Statistics

1971 Dux of Haileybury College, Victoria, Australia

1971 Victorian Government Senior Scholarship

1975 Shell (Australia) Postgraduate Scholarship in Science and Engineering

1982 Queen Elizabeth II Fellowship

1986 ANU PhD Scholarship

1991 Fulbright Commission Postdoctoral Fellowship

2009-2010 Member - Review Panel into Australia’s Superannuation System (the Cooper Review) 

2010-2015 Member - Australian Statistics Advisory Council

2010-2016 Member – Panel to choose Fulbright Scholars for the ACT/NT

2012 Member - Advisory Panel for the Australian Government’s ‘Australia in the Asian Century’ White Paper

2013 Member - Senior Review Team for the Australian Public Service Capability Review into the (then) Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

2013-2015 Member – Executive Management Committee of Department of Agriculture 

2015 Member - Advisory Board for the Bureau of Resources and Energy Economics

2014 Member - ANZSOG Research Committee

2014 ANU Public Policy Fellow

2017 Doctor of Science (Honoris Causa), University of Wollongong

2020 Member – National Data Advisory Council

2022 Officer of the Order of Australia (General Division)

1. Realising the potential of data in government: Address to the Institute of Public Administration Australia (ACT), 15 June 2022

2. The G20 at Ten: Past, Progress and Prospects: Address to the Lowy Institute, Sydney, 1 November 2018

3. What have we learnt? The Great Depression in Australia from the perspective of today, The 19th Annual Colin Clark Memorial Lecture, Brisbane, 11 November 2009 (joint with Colin Clark).

4. Reflections on the Global Financial Crisis, Address to the Sydney Institute, Sydney, 16 June 2009

5. The Economic Costs of Reducing Greenhouse Gas Emissions: Understanding the Treasury Modelling, Presentation to a CEDA National Forum, 11 November 2008.