Rythia Afkar is an economist with the World Bank’s Human Capital Project. She is based in Washington, DC, and engages with national governments and international organizations to help countries build, protect, and utilize their human capital. Her work focuses on various areas, including quality of education, public finance, and gender issues. She previously worked on education operations and research with the East Asia and Pacific unit and on poverty and social assistance with the poverty team in Indonesia. Her recent policy-oriented research focuses on improved efficiency of education expenditure in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea. She holds a doctorate in economics from the University of Bonn and received master’s degrees in quantitative economics from the University of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne.