Who is Glenn Hubbard?


Glenn Hubbard is undoubtedly one of the most notable scholars in the field of Economics of his time. Born in Florida in 1958, Hubbard attended the University of Central Florida, where he received two degrees in just three years. He followed his undergraduate study by earning a Ph.D. in Economics from Harvard University in 1983. Most of Hubbard's professional life has been dedicated to education and scholarly research in economics. His first stop upon graduating from Harvard was a teaching stint at Northwestern University. In 1988,  Hubbard joined the faculty at Columbia University. In addition to being a faculty member at Columbia, he has served as a visiting professor, advisor, and scholar at several other renowned universities and institutes. In 1994, Hubbard became the Russell L. Carson Professor of Economics, a prestigious title at Columbia University. Since 2004, Hubbard has been dean of Columbia Business School.

Hubbard's research focuses on public sector economics, tax policy, corporate finance, monetary economics, industrial organization, and international finance and he has published over 100 scholarly articles on the subjects. He is also the lead author on two prominent textbooks about monetary economics and financial markets, and the principles of economics. Hubbard's works have appeared in publications such as Business Week, the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, and others.

Hubbard is also notable for his government and political activism. From 1991 to 1993, he was Deputy Assistant Secretary at the U.S. Treasury Department, and served under President George W. Bush as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisors from 2001 to 2003. In that role, Hubbard helped design and implement Bush's 2003 Tax cuts, and advised the President on various other economic policies. Due to his involvement in President Bush's Council of Economic Advisors, it was rumored that Hubbard wanted to become Chairman of the Federal Reserve upon the retirement of Alan Greenspan. Instead, Ben Bernanke was nominated to the position, and Hubbard's rumored desire for the position sparked a spoof video made by Columbia business students and that video can be found here. Hubbard's political advisement continued, as he served as an economic advisor to Mitt Romney's campaigns in both 2008 and 2012. He was again the subject of rumors for various positions such as Fed Chair or Secretary of the Treasury.

Hubbard holds several distinctive roles in the corporate sector. He is on the board of directors for several corporations such as ADP, BlackRock Closed-End Funds, KKR Financial Corporation, and Met Life. He is also a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations, Chairman of the Economic Club of New York, and Co-Chairman of the Committee on Capital Markets Regulation. Hubbard was interviewed by documentary filmmaker Charles Ferguson for Ferguson's 2010 film, Inside Job. Ferguson asked Hubbard to discuss his advocacy for government deregulation, which the film (and Ferguson) argues led to the 2008 banking crises and economic downturn.

Prior to researching, I had not heard of Glenn Hubbard. After learning more about him, I'm surprised that I hadn't heard of him, due to his involvement in major political campaigns of recent years. Since most of Hubbard's most notable work is research and opinion on public sector economics, taxes, and other governmental economic issues, I am not sure how much his work will be relevant to our class. However, he has written articles on industrial organization, so maybe there is something there that could be relevant. I would be interested in learning more about Hubbard and reading some of his work more in depth, as he seems to have some interesting opinions on government policy.


References 

 https://www0.gsb.columbia.edu/faculty/ghubbard/hubbard-bio.pdf

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glenn_Hubbard_(economist)#cite_note-Segal-4

 https://www.glennhubbard.net/biography

Comments

  1. Professor ArvanSeptember 8, 2017 at 9:43 AM

    I'm curious to know whether students of your generation would be familiar with the Sting song that was the basis of the spoof video. It wouldn't mean as much if you weren't already familiar with the song.

    ReplyDelete

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