(2010-12-12) Orszag Joining Citigroup

Peter Orszag, who ran Barack Obama's OMB until this past August, joined CitiGroup’s investment banking group as a vice chairman... Mr. Orszag was the youngest member of Mr. Obama’s cabinet before resigning in July after a year and a half as budget director, a post in which he shaped the Economic Stimulus package and Healthcare Reform legislation.

James Fallows is not amused. I believe Orszag (whom I do not know at all) to be a faultlessly honest man, by the letter of the law. I am sorry for his judgment in taking this job, but I am implying nothing whatsoever "unethical" in a technical sense. But in the grander scheme, his move illustrates something that is just wrong. The idea that someone would help plan, advocate, and carry out an economic policy that played such a crucial role in the survival of a financial institution -- and then, less than two years after his Administration took office, would take a job that (a) exemplifies the growing disparities the Administration says it's trying to correct and (b) unavoidably will call on knowledge and contacts Orszag developed while in recent public service -- this says something bad about what is taken for granted in American public life... What choice did he have? He could have waited a while. He could have gone to a lucrative job at a business school or even a think tank, for perhaps half-a-million per year versus many millions. He could have written a book and gone big time on the lecture circuit. He could have taken a corporate job somewhere other than finance. He could have taken a finance job someplace other than Citibank (or Goldman Sachs or AIG etc..) There were other possibilities. I am sorry to go down a list like this, because it inevitably sounds preachy -- and again, this is not about Orszag except as an example. It's about the pattern, which people should be angry about.

Dec27 update on other Revolving Door cases.

Mar'2014: Orszag made $3M in 2013.