Mariarosaria Comunale is an Economist at the IMF in the Research Department, Development Macro Division. Prior to that she was Principal Research Economist at the Bank of Lithuania and Assistant Professor at Vilnius University. She worked at the ECB in the DG International & European Relations as ESCB-IO Economist, covering Western Balkans, and was on secondment at the National Bank of Austria analyzing private sector credit in Eastern Europe. She holds a Ph.D. in Money and Finance from the University of Rome Tor Vergata, and during her studies she was visiting PhD student at the Nederlandsche bank, the ECB, the University of Cambridge, and Trinity College Dublin. Her main area of research pertains to Applied International Macroeconomics, for analysis of imbalances, monetary policy, growth, and inequality.