On Tuesday, February 14th, President Biden announced that his former advisor on inflation and macroeconomics Brian Deese was stepping down from his position. Once out of office, Biden then appointed Lael Brainard as Deese's replacement. Brainard was a member of the FEDs board of governors for the past nine years or ever since 2014. This new position gives her the title of director of the National Economic Council and replaces a figure that has been in office since before Biden was elected as President. This switch of roles had no other government involvement as this specific position didn't need to be approved by the Senate, unlike many other economic government roles.
In this role, Brainard will be given tasks such as helping to implement Biden's economic agenda and giving him new insight into possible inflationary problems happening in the United States. Because of this change, there could be greater emphasis on different parts of our economy that Brian Deese wasn't highlighting as much during his time in office. This wasn't the first time that Brainard had been considered for an economic role in the government. Back in 2020, at the start of Biden's presidency, she was nominated as a possible replacement for the treasury secretary. Brainard, unfortunately, lost this nomination to another female candidate; Janet Yellen who is currently still the treasury secretary.
As Brainard starts her new career she has major inflationary problems to confront as inflation is at a high right now around the country, and is causing backlash as common goods such as eggs are becoming less and less affordable to many. Along with these problems she has to deal with underlying pandemic economic issues and has to push Biden's current economic policies further. Essentially Brainard has a lot on her plate and will have much to do with her newfound promotion.
1 comment:
I'm very curious to see if there will be any noticeable changes or if the new position holder will simply be an extension of the last. Many people are unhappy and have been criticizing the president and his cabinet about their responses to inflation or lack thereof. However, inflation is a very complex topic and can simply be remedied with only fiscal policy changes. I will be interested if any new ideas are brought forward to address the economic issues that the United States is currently facing.
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