Liya Palagashvili is a senior research fellow and director of the Labor Policy Project at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. Her research focuses on labor regulations, the gig economy, and the changing nature of work. Her writing has been published in academic journals, in books, and in media outlets such as the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal. She regularly writes for her Substack, Labor Market Matters, and for a column at The Hill. 

Palagashvili has testified before several state legislatures as well as for the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representatives. She serves on the Data Users Advisory Committee for the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and is a scholar at New York University School of Law. She was previously awarded as a Forbes ‘30 under 30’ in Law & Policy. Before joining the Mercatus Center, Palagashvili was a professor of economics at State University of New York-Purchase and a Visiting Scholar at King’s College London. She earned her PhD in economics at George Mason University and is an alum of the Mercatus PhD Fellowship.