New York TIMES / February 7, 2009 / http://www.nytimes.com/2009/02/07/business/07web-econ.html
Obama Set to Name Economic Panel By JEFF ZELENY WASHINGTON — President Obama is set to appoint on Friday a new team of outside economic advisers, led by a former Federal Reserve chairman, Paul Volcker, to offer independent advice to help the White House craft a response to the nation's growing recession. The White House Economic Recovery Advisory Board, modeled after the foreign intelligence board created by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, will include advisers from business, labor and academia. Administration officials said the 15-member team will be announced Friday morning at the White House. The president is naming the board as the administration prepares for another wave of stinging economic news with the January unemployment report. ... "The board will bring a diverse set of perspectives and voices from different parts of the country and different sectors of the economy to bear in the formulation and evaluation of economic policy," the White House said in a statement on Friday morning. The board, which will be announced in a White House ceremony, is also set to establish Mr. Volcker as a key member of the president's economic team. He has long been an adviser, but his role in the opening weeks of the administration has been undefined. The group also will include Jeffrey Immelt, chairman of General Electric, and Jim Owens, the chairman of Caterpillar Inc., which announced last week the layoff of 20,000 jobs. William Donaldson, a former Securities and Exchange Commission chairman, will also serve on the board, along with Roger Ferguson, the president of T.I.A.A.-CREF, and Martin Feldstein, a Harvard University professor, who was the chief economic adviser to President Ronald Reagan. The group also includes two leading labor officials: Richard Trumka of the A.F.L.-C.I.O. and Anna Burger of the Service Employees International Union. The board, which will meet for two years, will be guided by Austan Goolsbee, an economic adviser to the president.... [let's see: 2 labor reps and how many for capital?] -- Jim Devine / "Disbelief in magic can force a poor soul into believing in government and business." -- Tom Robbins _______________________________________________ pen-l mailing list [email protected] https://lists.csuchico.edu/mailman/listinfo/pen-l
