Wednesday, October 13, 2010
Peter Diamond
Peter Diamond, a professor of economics at MIT, is not qualified to serve on the board of governors for the Federal Reserve, says U.S. Senator Richard Shelby (R-Alabama), who is holding up the nominee’s confirmation.
Diamond is an authority on taxation, Social Security, pensions, Medicare, labor markets and behavioral economics—and was just awarded the Nobel Prize in economics. One of his students was Ben Bernanke, the current chairman of the Fed.
Shelby insists Diamond lacks the broad macroeconomic experience to help run the central bank.
Of the five current Fed governors, only two—Bernanke and Vice Chairman Donald Kohn—are academic economists who specialize in monetary economics. The other three include a former community banker, a former Wall Street executive and a legal scholar.
Shelby has held up other nominees before. Earlier this year, he delayed the confirmations of more than 70 nominees in order to convince the Obama administration to award a $35 billion defense contract to his state.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Fed Nominee Whom Sen. Shelby Deemed Too Unqualified To Confirm Wins Nobel Prize (by Ian Millhiser, Think Progress)
Fed Nominee Said to Lack Experience (by Sewell Chan, New York Times)
Sen. Shelby Blocks 70 Obama Nominees to Bring Defense Contracts to Alabama (by Noel Brinkerhoff, AllGov)
Comments