Saul Eslake was born in England, whilst his parents (who were originally from Sydney) were living there, and came to Tasmania with them and his three siblings at the age of 8 in 1966. He went to primary school in Smithton, and then high school and university in Hobart, graduating with a First Class Honours degree in Economics in 1978.
He began his professional career at the Commonwealth Treasury in Canberra in 1979, returned briefly to Tasmania in 1981, before moving to Melbourne in 1981, where he remained until the end of 2014 when he returned to Tasmania, this time permanently.
During his time in Melbourne Saul was Chief Economist for a number of financial institutions, including McIntosh Securities (a stockbroker), the funds management subsidiary of National Mutual Life, the ANZ Bank, and the Australian subsidiary of Bank of America-Merrill Lynch (a Wall Street investment bank). In between those last two roles he worked for the Grattan Institute, a newly-established public policy ‘think tank’.
Since 2015 Saul has been running his own economics consultancy business, Corinna Economic Advisory.
Saul has been a member of a number of government advisory bodies and Boards over the course of his career, including the Howard Government’s Trade Policy and Foreign Affairs Advisory Councils, the Rudd & Gillard Government’s National Housing Supply Council and Long-Term Tourism Strategy Committee, the board of Hydro Tasmania and the Tasmanian Arts Advisory Board (which he chaired for five years). He is currently a member of the Federal Parliamentary Budget Office’s Expert Advisory Panel, and of the Reserve Bank’s Monetary Policy Board Expert Advisory Panel. He’s also on the Board of the Council on the Ageing Australia (COTA).