Two long-time think tankers have been tapped for new top positions within the Biden Administration. Here is more from the New York Times:
President Biden has selected Lael Brainard, the vice chair of the Federal Reserve, to direct the National Economic Council, according to people familiar with the decision.
He is also expected to tap Jared Bernstein, a longtime member of his inner circle dating back to Mr. Biden’s tenure as vice president, to be the next chair of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. Mr. Bernstein is currently a member of the council.
[Bernstein] has spent most of his career not in academia, but in Washington think tanks, with a longtime focus on economic inequality and on policies meant to lift wages and living standards for American workers.
He worked 16 years at the liberal, pro-labor Economic Policy Institute before Mr. Biden hired him to be the chief economist for the vice president when Mr. Biden and President Barack Obama took office in 2009. In announcing his departure, E.P.I. officials called Mr. Bernstein “a tireless advocate for middle- and low-income families and for greater equity in the U.S. economy.”
Brainard was a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution from 2001 to 2009. Her husband, Kurt Campbell, co-founded the Center for a New American Security (CNAS) and has been affiliated with a number of other think tanks.
Meanwhile, former Sen. Rob Portman (R-OH) has joined the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) as a distinguished visiting fellow for public policy.
