Former Fed chair Bernanke to take Brookings job
A big hire for Brookings.
They've got former Fed chairman Ben Bernanke on board, after eight years at the head of the central bank.
Bernanke's new title is that of "distinguished fellow in reisdence" at the Hutchins Center on Fiscal and Monetary Policy.
Here's what David Wessel, director of the Hutchins Center, has to say on the appointment:
Ben Bernanke won’t have to sit through any more meetings of the Federal Open Market Committee or deliver the Fed’s semi-annual testimony to an occasionally hostile Congress or listen to complaints from emerging-market central bankers when central bankers gather in Basel, Switzerland. He won’t have to check the computer screen to see what’s been happening in Asian markets when he gets up every morning.
He will, instead, have time to reflect on what just happened. “ I was kind of like if you're in a car wreck. You're mostly involved in trying to avoid going off the bridge. And then later on you say, ‘Oh, my God,’ ” he said here recently.
Today will see Bernanke's successor, Janet Yellen, sworn into her role as Fed chair.