Yang Yao is a member of executive council at Institute of Digital Finance(IDF), a professor at the China Center for Economic Research (CCER) and the National School of Development (NSD), Peking University. He currently serves as the director of CCER and the dean of NSD. He is a member of the China Finance 40 Forum. His research interests include economic transition and development in China. He has published more than hundred research papers in international and domestic journals as well as several books on institutional economics and economic development in China. He is also a prolific writer for magazines and newspapers, including the Financial Times and the Project Syndicate.

Dr. Yao was awarded the 2008 and 2014 Sun Yefang Award in Economic Science, the 2008 and 2010 Pu Shan Award in International Economics and the 2008 Zhang Peigang Award in Development Economics, and was named the Best Teacher by the Peking University Student Union in 2006.

Dr Yao obtained a BS in geography in 1986 and an MS in economics in 1989, both from Peking University, and his PhD in development economics from the department of agricultural and applied economics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1996.