Amy Liu is a senior fellow and co-director of the Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program. She and Bruce Katz, the Institution’s Vice President, launched the program in 1996 to provide decision-makers with the latest trends analyses, policy ideas, and on-the-ground practices to help metropolitan areas compete and prosper. Over the years, she has worked directly with neighborhood, city, suburban, and rural leaders within metropolitan areas; and government, business and civic leaders at the regional, state, and national level to address the most pressing challenges and opportunities facing our communities.
Liu is a frequent speaker on ways to advance U.S. economic competitiveness by harnessing the unique assets of regional economies. She particularly focuses on the importance of strengthening industry clusters, innovation, skills, and exports and trade to excel in the global economy.
Liu is leading a “practice” effort at Brookings to help civic, political, and business leaders in metro areas adopt intentional, market-oriented strategies for growth, including the role of state and federal policies to align with those strategies. She is also advancing a Global Cities Initiative to help U.S. and international cities, with their state partners, act on their roles as engines of the global economy.
Liu has authored a number of Brookings publications, including Establish a Regional Export Accelerator Challenge (REACH) Grant Program to Boost U.S. Exports and Trade Capacity, Ten Steps to Delivering a Successful Metro Export Plan, and Delivering the Next Economy: The States Step Up. Her op-eds and commentary have appeared in the New York Times, Reuters, and the Huffington Post. She is also an expert on the rebuilding efforts in greater New Orleans and southern Louisiana post Hurricane Katrina. She is often cited for her co-authorship of the The New Orleans Index at Five.
Prior to Brookings, Liu was Special Assistant to HUD Secretary Henry Cisneros and staffed a U.S. Senate Banking Committee’s subcommittee on housing and urban affairs.
