Giavazzi graduated in electrical engineering from the Politecnico di Milano university in 1972 and obtained a PhD in economics from Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1978 under the supervision of Rudi Dornbusch.
In addition to being a professor at Bocconi University in Milan, he is a Research Fellow and a Trustee of Centre for Economic Policy Research (CEPR), a member of the Strategic Committee of Agence France Trésor, and of the Group of Economic Policy Advisers to the President of the European Commission, José Manuel Barroso.
During the D'Alema government (1998–2000) he was a member of the Council of Economic Advisers to the Italian prime minister.
He was Director General of the Italian Treasury responsible for debt management and privatizations from 1992 to 1994.
[1] His polemic was criticized by Karl Whelan, a professor of economics at University College Dublin.