Elizabeth Warren Gets The Job

by Stuart Shapiro

President Obama today announced that he was appointing Elizabeth Warren as a Special Adviser to the Treasury Secretary to assist with the creation of the Consumer Protection Financial Bureau.

“Getting the agency off the ground is a task that can’t wait,” Obama said. Warren “is the best person to stand this agency up…it only make sense that she should be the architect,” he added.

I’ve blogged on Warren’s appointment several times and this announcement comes as a welcome relief.  She will work to set up the agency and make sure it is staffed with officials dedicated to consumer protection, not credit card company protection or bank protection.  The appointment avoids a Senate confirmation fight and allows the formation of the agency to start immediately.  This is the best thing President Obama could have done to ensure that the financial reform legislation has teeth.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.