The U.S. Senate on Thursday, April 14, confirmed the appointment of Haas Professor Carl Shapiro to the president’s Council of Economic Advisers. President Barack Obama nominated him to the council in February.
The Council of Economic Advisers, comprised of a chairman and one member, is charged with providing the president with advice on both domestic and international economic policy. Shapiro succeeds Princeton University Professor Cecilia Rouse.
“Carl Shapiro has demonstrated knowledge and dedication throughout his career," President Obama said in his nomination of Shapiro. "I am grateful that he has chosen to take on this important role, and I look forward to working with him in the months and years to come."
Shapiro, the Haas School's Transamerica Professor of Business Strategy, has been on leave to serve as the deputy assistant attorney general for economics in the U.S. Department of Justice's Antitrust Division, where he supervises more than fifty PhD economists in the Antitrust Division’s Economic Analysis Group. He also served in this role from 1995 to 1996.
A professor at Haas since 1990, Shapiro helped establish UC Berkeley as a leading force in patent reform by bringing Federal Trade Commission hearings to the Haas School and organizing a campus-wide conference on patent reform.
In 1999, Shapiro and Haas Professor Hal Varian (now on leave to serve as chief economist at Google) co-authored Information Rules: A Strategic Guide to the Network Economy, a widely acclaimed book that deconstructs the economic factors affecting information technology markets.
Shapiro joins a growing cast of Haas School and UC Berkeley faculty members who have served on the Council of Economic Advisers. Both Haas Professor and former Dean Laura Tyson and Professor Emerita Janet Yellen served as chairs of the council under President Bill Clinton. Tyson went on to serve as chair of the National Economic Council. Yellen is now vice-chair of the Federal Reserve.
UC Berkeley Economics Professor Christina Romer served as chair of the council from 2009 to 2010. Haas professors Jonathan Leonard, David Levine, and Jim Wilcox and Haas Assistant Dean of Instruction Jay Stowsky have served on the staff of the council as senior economists.