Lucas Papademos

Lucas Papademos Λουκάς Παπαδήμος
Prime Minister of Greece
Incumbent
Assumed office 11 November 2011
President	Karolos Papoulias
Deputy	Theodoros Pangalos Evangelos Venizelos
Preceded by	George Papandreou
Vice President of the European Central Bank
In office 31 May 2002 – 31 May 2010
President	Wim Duisenberg Jean-Claude Trichet
Preceded by	Christian Noyer
Succeeded by	Vítor Constâncio
Governor of the Bank of Greece
In office 26 October 1994 – 31 May 2002
Deputy	Panagiotis Thomopoulos
Preceded by	Ioannis Boutos
Succeeded by	Nikolaos Garganas
Personal details
Born	11 October 1947 (1947-10-11) Athens, Greece
Political party	Independent
Spouse(s)	Sana Ingram
Alma mater	Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Website	Prime Minister's Office

Lucas Papademos (Greek: Λουκάς Παπαδήμος, Greek pronunciation: [luˈkas papaˈðimos], Loukas Papadimos; born 11 October 1947) is a Greek economist who was appointed as Prime Minister of Greece on 11 November 2011.

Previously, he was Governor of the Bank of Greece from 1994 to 2002 and Vice President of the European Central Bank from 2002 to 2010. He was also a visiting professor of public policy at the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and a Senior Fellow at the Center for Financial Studies at the University of Frankfurt.

Education and career

Papademos was born in Athens but his parents were from the town of Desfina in Phocis. After graduating from Athens College, Papademos attended the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, gaining a degree in physics in 1970, a masters degree in electrical engineering in 1972, and a doctorate in economics in 1978.

In 1975, he worked with Franco Modigliani on the NAIRU concept, introduced under the term NIRU (non-inflationary rate of unemployment). He taught economics at Columbia University from 1975 until 1984, and then at the University of Athens from 1988 to 1993.

He has served as Senior Economist at the Federal Reserve Bank of Boston in 1980. He joined the Bank of Greece in 1985 as Chief Economist, rising to Deputy Governor in 1993 and Governor in 1994. During his time as Governor of the national bank, Papademos was involved in Greece's transition from the drachma to the euro as its national currency.

After leaving the Bank of Greece in 2002, Papademos became the Vice President to Wim Duisenberg (and then Jean-Claude Trichet) at the European Central Bank from 2002 to 2010. In 2010 he left that position to serve as an advisor to Prime Minister George Papandreou.

He has been a member of the Trilateral Commission since 1998.

He is a member of the Academy of Athens. He has published numerous articles in the fields of macroeconomic theory, the structure and functioning of financial markets, monetary analysis and policy, theory of chaos as well as on subjects concerning the economic performance, financial stability, financial instability and economic policy in the European Union. He has also delivered addresses on the Greek debt crisis.

Prime Minister

Prime Minister Papademos speaking to the parliament in November 2011

See also: Greek government debt crisis and European sovereign debt crisis

Papademos was proposed for the position of Prime Minister of Greece on 10 November 2011, after the head of the governing party, George Papandreou, decided to step down, and allow a provisional coalition government to form with the task of taking Greece out of the major political crisis caused by the country's debt crisis.

Lucas Papademos set two conditions in order to accept being the prime minister of an interim government. First, that the new government would not have a very restricted life span as the New Democracy party had demanded and secondly, that political figures from both main political parties, PASOK and New Democracy, would participate, which was also vetoed by New Democracy. Eventually New Democracy accepted Papademos' demands, and the new cabinet includes Ministers from PASOK, New Democracy and the far right Popular Orthodox Rally.

After a week of political turmoil, the new coalition cabinet and Prime Minister Lucas Papademos were formally sworn in on 11 November 2011. The new government is a coalition between three of five parliamentary parties, PASOK, New Democracy and the Popular Orthodox Rally. The remaining two parliamentary parties, the Communist Party and the Coalition of the Radical Left Party, had refused Papandreou's invitation to join talks on a new unity government. It is the first time that the far right has joined a Greek government since the fall of the military junta in 1974.

The coalition government's main task is to allow the EU bailout to proceed and eventually to pave the way for elections, temporarily set for February 2012. Papademos, who is not an elected PM, has said his priority will be to keep Greece in the eurozone.

In January 2012, Papademos warned that workers would have to accept cuts in income for a default to be avoided. He told business and labor leaders that the "troika" — the European Union, the I.M.F. and the European Central Bank — was looking for Greece to take steps to open up so-called closed professions, as well as adjustments to the minimum wage, abolition of Christmas and summer vacation bonuses and automatic wage increases.

Personal life

Papademos has been married to Shanna Ingram—of Dutch descent—for more than 30 years. They have no children.

External links

• Curriculum vitae at the ECB website
• BBC Profile
• Articles at Bloomberg

Business positions
Preceded by Ioannis Boutos	Governor of the Bank of Greece 1994–2002	Succeeded by Nikolaos Garganas
Preceded by Christian Noyer	Vice President of the European Central Bank 2002–2010	Succeeded by Vítor Constâncio
Political offices
Preceded by George Papandreou	Prime Minister of Greece 2011–present	Incumbent