Michael J. Boskin

Michael J. Boskin is the Tully M. Friedman Professor of Economics and Wohlford Family Senior Fellow, Hoover Institution, Stanford University, and Research Associate, NBER.  He served as Chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) from 1989 to 1993, when he helped resolve the Third World Debt and Saving and Loan financial crises, expand regional and global trade, introduce emissions trading in environmental regulation and place the first effective controls on government spending while protecting the defense budget.  His CEA was rated by the Council for Excellence in Government as one of the five most respected agencies in the federal government.  Earlier, on Presidential Candidate Reagan’s Tax Policy Task Force, he helped develop the policies that substantially lowered marginal tax rates, indexed tax brackets for inflation, accelerated depreciation, and created IRAs and 401ks, the intellectual justification for which was based on his research on the effect of taxes on saving.  He later chaired the blue-ribbon Commission on the Consumer Price Index, whose report has transformed the way government statistical agencies around the world measure inflation, GDP and productivity.  

 

Dr. Boskin serves on several corporate and philanthropic Boards of Directors.  He writes regularly on economic policy in the Wall Street Journal and on global economics in a bi-monthly column syndicated in 145 countries.  He has advised four U.S. Presidents, as well as several U.K. Prime Ministers, German Chancellors, Chinese Premiers, Chilean Presidents and India’s fiscal and monetary authorities on economic policy and reform.

 

Dr. Boskin received his B.A. with highest honors and the Chancellor’s award as outstanding undergraduate from the University of California, Berkeley, where he also received his M.A. and his Ph.D., all in economics.  He is the author of several books and more than 150 articles on world economic growth, tax and budget theory and policy, Social Security, U.S. saving and consumption patterns, the economics of deficits and debt, and the implications of changing technology and demography on capital, labor and product markets.  He is the recipient of numerous professional awards, but is most proud of Stanford’s Distinguished Teaching Award.