Areas of Expertise
Leonard Nakamura has been at the Bank since 1988, spending much of his prolific career studying economic measurement, banking, and finance. He was one of the early proponents of incorporating investment in software and other intellectual property like R&D and marketing into GDP. He challenges our assumptions about traditional economic measurement; he believes inflation is slower than we think and that the economy is growing faster than we think. His work on “free” internet content and how it impacts GDP measurement has been featured on Wharton Business Radio.
Leonard is very interested in what sort of information is useful in offering loans, such as mortgages. His work with Bill Lang on redlining has been one of the theoretical justifications for the regulation of mortgage lending, such as the Community Reinvestment Act.
In addition to his work at the Bank, Leonard has been a visiting professor at Swarthmore College, a lecturer at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and Bryn Mawr College, and an assistant professor at Rutgers University. He received his Ph.D. and M.A. in economics from Princeton University, and a B.A. in social sciences from Swarthmore College.