Obama's Top Econ Advisor Hails From Think Tank Land

This week The Washington Post profiled Jason Furman's life from his time at Harvard as Matt Damon's roomate to recently becoming President Obama's top economist.  Between those two times, Furman was heavily involved in think tank land.  Here is more from the article:

After the [John] Kerry campaign, Furman joined the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and continued to fight against George W. Bush — this time arguing against the president’s plans to partially privatize Social Security, which ultimately failed.

“I remember him wandering around with this laptop at the Center on Budget,” said David Kamin, a research assistant whom Furman later recruited to the White House. “It sort of taught me the power [of] a nerdy guy wielding a laptop.”

The article, however, does not mention Furman's work at the Brookings Institution.  From 2007-2009, Furman was a Senior Fellow and Director of The Hamilton Project at the think tank.

Here is a previous Think Tank Watch post about Furman picking the new Federal Reserve Chairman.

Interestingly, the conservative think tank American Enterprise Institute (AEI) endorsed Furman's nomination to lead the White House Council of Economic Advisers (CEA).