Orszag, Peter

▪ American economist

in full  Peter Richard Orszag 

born Dec. 16, 1968, Boston, Mass., U.S.

 

 American economist who served as an economic adviser to U.S. Pres. Bill Clinton (Clinton, Bill), director of the Congressional Budget Office (2007–08), and director of the Office of Management and Budget (2009– ) in the administration of Pres. Barack Obama (Obama, Barack).

      Orszag graduated from the prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy, and he earned an undergraduate degree in economics from Princeton University in 1991. He received a master's degree (1992) and a Ph.D. (1997) from the London School of Economics, and he worked for the Council of Economic Advisers (1993–94, 1995–96) during the Clinton administration. From 1997 to 1998 he served as a special economic adviser to President Clinton. Orszag entered the private sector in 1998, working as a budget consultant and teaching macroeconomics at the University of California, Berkeley. He was a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution (2001–07); while there he researched topics such as retirement planning, tax policy, and higher-education funding. In 2007 Orszag was appointed head of the Congressional Budget Office, a nonpartisan government agency that provides legislators with budget projections and economic forecasts. He left that position in 2008 when President-elect Barack Obama nominated him to serve as director of the Office of Management and Budget. Orszag assumed the post in January 2009 after being confirmed by the Senate.

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