Turnover at the NEC
Andrew Samwick at Vox Baby reports that Stephen Friedman will be stepping down as director of the President's National Economic Council (NEC) at the end of the year, "Steve Friedman to Step Down at the NEC", and has some thoughts on who should take his place (Deputy Director Keith Hennessy).
The director of the NEC is responsible for economic policy coordination within the administration. Samwick outlines the formal responsibilities. Among other things, Samwick's post is worthwhile for its insights into the practical meaning of the formal responsibilities, and for its thoughts on the type of person needed to fill the job.
Kash over at Angry Bear also posts on the changing of the administration's economic guard: "Help Wanted: Economic Advisors for President"
Kash says that the NEC Chair is typically an administration's top economic policy salesman, and that Friedman has maintained an unusually low profile. Friedman has had a low profile, but I'm not sure that "chief economic spokesman" is an appropriate role for this position. The NEC was formed to perform a policy coordination function on behalf of the president. The director needs to encourage the great government departments to participate in a joint economic policy making process with other agencies. Department heads would resent a director who tried to speak on their behalf. An attempt to do so might be seen as undercutting departmental independence.
I have no idea how Friedman has performed in what I imagine is his primary mission, which should be (a) getting the different departments to buy into the Council process as a way of ensuring their points of view are represented in White House decision making, and of ensuring that the President gets a dispassionate presentation of a meaningful selection of options (the "honest broker" function), and (b) follow up - promoting the coordinated administrative and legislative implementation of the President's economic policies.
Both posts link back to a Jonathan Weisman story in Wednesday's Washington Post: "Top Economic Adviser to Bush Is Leaving Post". Weisman reports that N. Gregory Mankiw, the Chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisors, is also expected to leave next year.
Comments
You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.