Lael Brainard

Lael Brainard (born January 1, 1962) is an American economist serving as the 14th director of the National Economic Council since February 21, 2023.

She previously served as the 22nd vice chair of the Federal Reserve between May 2022 and February 2023.

Founded in 1964, the White House Fellowship is one of America’s most prestigious programs for leadership and public service.

The Fellowship, awarded on a strictly non-partisan basis, offers exceptional young leaders first-hand experience working at the highest levels of federal government.

She graduated from Wesleyan University in 1983 and received a PhD from Harvard University in 1989 as a National Science Foundation Fellow.

Lael Brainard, daughter of the U.S. foreign-service officer and diplomat Alfred Brainard, grew up in West Germany and later Poland in the period before the Revolutions of 1989 and the Fall of the Berlin Wall.

She graduated with university honors from Wesleyan University with a Bachelor of Arts degree from the College of Social Studies.

Brainard received masters and doctoral degrees in economics from Harvard University, where she was a National Science Foundation Fellow.

She is the recipient of a White House Fellowship and a Council on Foreign Relations International Affairs Fellowship.

Brainard served as assistant and associate professor of Applied Economics at the MIT Sloan School of Management from 1990 to 1996 where her publications made important contributions on the relationship between offshore production, trade, and jobs; the measurement of structural and cyclical unemployment in the U.S. economy; and strategic trade policy.

Brainard was a White House Fellow in 1994-1995.

She was a professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology for six years before joining the Clinton administration as an economic advisor in 1997.

Beginning in 1997 Brainard served as deputy national economic advisor and deputy assistant to the president during the Clinton administration.

In this role, she was the White House staff coordinator for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) Leaders Meeting in Vancouver and Manila; responsible for the President's three-year review of NAFTA; and for preparing the way for China's entry into the WTO.

She was also responsible for the G7/G8 Jobs Conferences in the U.K. and France, and took part in President Clinton's visits to China, Latin America, the U.K., and the Summit of the Americas held in Miami.

As deputy director of the National Economic Council, she helped build a new White House organization to address global economic challenges such as the Asian financial crisis and China's accession to the World Trade Organization.

As the U.S. Sherpa to the G8, she helped shape the 2000 G8 summit that, for the first time, included leaders of the poorest nations and laid the foundations for the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria.

She then worked as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution from 2001 to 2009.

Brainard was a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution from 2001 to 2009 and Vice President and Director of the Global Economy and Development Program from 2006 to 2009.

Brainard was nominated by Barack Obama to serve as the Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs at the Department of the Treasury on March 23, 2009.

On March 23, 2009, President Obama nominated Brainard to serve as Under Secretary of the Treasury for International Affairs.

Reuters News Service reported on December 23, 2009, that the Senate Finance Committee had approved Brainard to become the "Treasury Department's top global diplomat, a job that would give her a key role in the bid to push China toward a flexible currency".

Before her appointment to the Federal Reserve, she served as the under secretary of the treasury for international affairs from 2010 to 2013.

The daughter of an American diplomat, Brainard was born in Hamburg and spent her childhood in West Germany and Poland.

She was confirmed to the position by a 78–19 vote in the U.S. Senate on April 20, 2010, and was sworn in on the same day.

The Senate confirmed her in a 78–19 vote on April 20, 2010.

She tendered her resignation on November 8, 2013, amid indicators in the professional community that she would be a viable nominee to the Fed board.

Prior to her term as vice chair, Brainard served as a member of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, taking office in 2014.

Following the resignation of Elizabeth Ashburn Duke, Brainard was nominated to the Fed board on January 13, 2014, alongside Stanley Fischer and Jerome Powell.

She was confirmed by a 61–31 vote in the U.S. Senate on June 12, 2014; her 14-year term began when she was sworn in four days later.

She now serves as administrative governor and chair of four committees: Financial Stability; Federal Reserve Bank Affairs; Consumer and Community Affairs; and Payments, Clearing and Settlements.

She received the Alexander Hamilton Award for her service at the Department of the Treasury and was awarded the Harvard GSAS Centennial Medal and the New York Association of Business Economics William F. Butler Award in 2019.

Brainard started her career at McKinsey & Company advising corporate clients on strategic challenges.

During the 2020 presidential transition of Joe Biden, Brainard had been viewed by media outlets as an early frontrunner to be Secretary of the Treasury, though Janet Yellen was chosen instead.

President Biden nominated Brainard to serve as Vice Chair of the Federal Reserve on November 22, 2021, succeeding Richard Clarida in the role.

On April 26, 2022, her nomination as Federal Reserve Vice Chair was confirmed by the U.S. Senate.

She was sworn in on May 23, 2022.

In February 2023, Biden announced Brainard as Brian Deese's successor as Director of the National Economic Council (NEC).

She resigned her positions as Federal Reserve governor and Vice Chair on February 18, 2023.

As NEC director, Brainard additionally serves as chair of the White House Competition Council.