Neil Irwin is a Washington Post columnist and the economics editor of Wonkblog, The Post’s site for policy news and analysis. Each weekday morning his Econ Agenda column reports and explains the latest trends in economics, finance, and the policies that shape both. He is the author of “The Alchemists: Three Central Bankers and a World on Fire,” a book about the efforts of the world’s central banks to combat the financial crisis and its aftermath, to be published in spring 2013 by the Penguin Press. Irwin covered economics and the Federal Reserve for The Post from 2007 to 2012, where he helped lead coverage of the 2007 to 2009 financial crisis, recession and government response. He has been a reporter at the Post since 2000, and also covered topics including the Washington regional economy, economic development and Internet companies. He was a Knight-Bagehot Fellow in Economic and Business Journalism at Columbia University, from which he has an MBA. Irwin’s undergraduate studies were at St. Mary’s College of Maryland.