Robert Glenn Hubbard (born September 4, 1958) is an American
economist
An economist is a professional and practitioner in the social sciences, social science discipline of economics.
The individual may also study, develop, and apply theories and concepts from economics and write about economic policy. Within this ...
and academic. He served as the Dean of the
Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
Graduate School of Business from 2004 to 2019, where he remains the
Russell L. Carson Professor of
Finance
Finance is the study and discipline of money, currency and capital assets. It is related to, but not synonymous with economics, the study of production, distribution, and consumption of money, assets, goods and services (the discipline of fina ...
and
Economics
Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services.
Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...
.
On September 13, 2018, he announced that he would retire from his position after his contract expired on June 30, 2019. Hubbard previously served as Deputy Assistant Secretary at the
U.S. Department of the Treasury
The Department of the Treasury (USDT) is the national treasury and finance department of the federal government of the United States, where it serves as an executive department. The department oversees the Bureau of Engraving and Printing and t ...
from 1991 to 1993, and as
Chairman
The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...
of the
Council of Economic Advisers
The Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) is a United States agency within the Executive Office of the President established in 1946, which advises the President of the United States on economic policy. The CEA provides much of the empirical resea ...
from 2001 to 2003.
Hubbard is a visiting scholar at the
conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization i ...
American Enterprise Institute
The American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research, known simply as the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), is a center-right Washington, D.C.–based think tank that researches government, politics, economics, and social welfare. A ...
, where he studies
tax policy
Tax policy includes the guidelines developed by a government regarding how taxes are imposed, in what amounts, and on whom. It has both microeconomic and macroeconomic aspects. The macroeconomic aspect concerns the overall quantity of taxes t ...
and
health care
Health care or healthcare is the improvement of health via the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, amelioration or cure of disease, illness, injury, and other physical and mental impairments in people. Health care is delivered by health profe ...
.
[ He was criticized for his reports and papers on ]deregulation
Deregulation is the process of removing or reducing state regulations, typically in the economic sphere. It is the repeal of governmental regulation of the economy. It became common in advanced industrial economies in the 1970s and 1980s, as a ...
during the 2008 banking crisis. He was also heavily criticized in the documentary ''Inside Job
An insider threat is a malicious threat to an organization that comes from people within the organization, such as employees, former employees, contractors or business associates, who have inside information concerning the organization's security ...
'' about the credit default swap scams that led to the world financial collapse in 2008. He is seen being aggressive towards the reporter when being asked certain questions.
Early life
Born September 4, 1958, Hubbard was raised in Apopka, Florida
Apopka is a city in Orange County, Florida. The city's population was 55,000 at the 2020 census. It is part of the Orlando–Kissimmee–Sanford Metropolitan Statistical Area. ''Apopka'' comes from Seminole word ''Ahapopka'' for "Potato eating ...
, a suburb of Orlando, Florida
Orlando () is a city in the U.S. state of Florida and is the county seat of Orange County, Florida, Orange County. In Central Florida, it is the center of the Greater Orlando, Orlando metropolitan area, which had a population of 2,509,831, acco ...
. His father taught at a local community college and his mother taught at a high school. Hubbard's younger brother, Gregg, is a member of the country-pop band Sawyer Brown
Sawyer Brown is an American country music band. It was founded in 1981 in Apopka, Florida, by Mark Miller (lead vocals, rhythm guitar), Gregg "Hobie" Hubbard (keyboards, vocals), Bobby Randall (lead guitar, vocals), Joe "Curly" Smyth (drums), and ...
.
Hubbard is an Eagle Scout. A member of the chess team, he graduated at the top of his class. He scored well enough on his College Level Examination Program to enter the University of Central Florida
The University of Central Florida (UCF) is a public research university whose main campus is in unincorporated Orange County, Florida. UCF also has nine smaller regional campuses throughout central Florida. It is part of the State University ...
with enough credits to graduate with two degrees in three years. He obtained his B.A.
Bachelor of arts (BA or AB; from the Latin ', ', or ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for an undergraduate program in the arts, or, in some cases, other disciplines. A Bachelor of Arts degree course is generally completed in three or four yea ...
and B.S.
A Bachelor of Science (BS, BSc, SB, or ScB; from the Latin ') is a bachelor's degree awarded for programs that generally last three to five years.
The first university to admit a student to the degree of Bachelor of Science was the University ...
degrees '' summa cum laude'' from the University of Central Florida in 1979, and his masters and Ph.D.
A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is ...
in economics from Harvard University
Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
in 1983.[
]
Career
Academic
Hubbard has been at Columbia University
Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...
since 1988, being Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics since 1994.[
He was named ]Dean
Dean may refer to:
People
* Dean (given name)
* Dean (surname), a surname of Anglo-Saxon English origin
* Dean (South Korean singer), a stage name for singer Kwon Hyuk
* Dean Delannoit, a Belgian singer most known by the mononym Dean
Titles
* ...
of Columbia Business School on July 1, 2004.
Government
Hubbard was Deputy Assistant Secretary at the U.S. Department of the Treasury from 1991 to 1993.[American Enterprise Institute]
R. Glenn Hubbard
/ref>
From February 2001 until March 2003, Hubbard was chairman
The chairperson, also chairman, chairwoman or chair, is the presiding officer of an organized group such as a board, committee, or deliberative assembly. The person holding the office, who is typically elected or appointed by members of the grou ...
of the Council of Economic Advisors
The Council of Economic Advisers (CEA) is a United States agency within the Executive Office of the President established in 1946, which advises the President of the United States on economic policy. The CEA provides much of the empirical resea ...
under President George W. Bush
George Walker Bush (born July 6, 1946) is an American politician who served as the 43rd president of the United States from 2001 to 2009. A member of the Republican Party, Bush family, and son of the 41st president George H. W. Bush, he ...
. A supply-side economist, he was instrumental in the design of the 2003 Bush Tax cuts.[
He was tipped by some media outlets to be a candidate for the position of ]Chairman of the Federal Reserve
The chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is the head of the Federal Reserve, and is the active executive officer of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The chair shal ...
when Alan Greenspan
Alan Greenspan (born March 6, 1926) is an American economist who served as the 13th chairman of the Federal Reserve from 1987 to 2006. He works as a private adviser and provides consulting for firms through his company, Greenspan Associates LLC. ...
retired, although he was not nominated for the position.
Political advisor
Hubbard served as economic advisor to the 2012 presidential campaign of Mitt Romney, a position he also held during Romney's 2008 presidential campaign. In August 2012, ''Politico
''Politico'' (stylized in all caps), known originally as ''The Politico'', is an American, German-owned political journalism newspaper company based in Arlington County, Virginia, that covers politics and policy in the United States and intern ...
'' identified Hubbard as "a likely Romney appointee as Federal Reserve chairman
The chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is the head of the Federal Reserve, and is the active executive officer of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The chair shall preside at the meetings of the Boa ...
or Treasury secretary
The United States secretary of the treasury is the head of the United States Department of the Treasury, and is the chief financial officer of the federal government of the United States. The secretary of the treasury serves as the principal a ...
".[
Hubbard was an economic advisor for the ]Jeb Bush 2016 presidential campaign
The 2016 presidential campaign of Jeb Bush, the 43rd Governor of Florida, was formally launched on June 15, 2015, coming six months after announcing the formal exploration of a candidacy for the 2016 Republican nomination for the President of ...
.[ After ]Donald Trump
Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is an American politician, media personality, and businessman who served as the 45th president of the United States from 2017 to 2021.
Trump graduated from the Wharton School of the University of Pe ...
became the presumptive Republican nominee, Hubbard was mentioned as a potential Treasury secretary (which eventually went to Steven Mnuchin), and also as a potential Fed chair, a role expected to become open in February 2018.[ Hubbard had been critical of both Trump and Democratic presidential candidate ]Hillary Clinton
Hillary Diane Rodham Clinton ( Rodham; born October 26, 1947) is an American politician, diplomat, and former lawyer who served as the 67th United States Secretary of State for President Barack Obama from 2009 to 2013, as a United States sen ...
, including after Bush had suspended his campaign. In August 2016, Hubbard declined to say which candidate he supported in the general election, but did say that Trump's taxation plans and their impact on economic growth were in a "direction" somewhat better than Clinton's plans. Hubbard criticized Trump's plans on trade and immigration for their predicted economic impact.
Other
Hubbard serves as co-chair of the Committee on Capital Markets Regulation
The Committee on Capital Markets Regulation is an independent and nonpartisan 501(c)(3) research organization financed by contributions from individuals, foundations, and corporations.
Background
Thirty-six leaders from the financial sector, incl ...
.
Hubbard is a member of the Board of Directors of Automatic Data Processing, Inc., BlackRock Closed-End Funds, Capmark Financial Corporation, Duke Realty
Duke Realty was a real estate investment trust based in Indianapolis, Indiana that invested in industrial warehouses. As of December 31, 2021, it owned or jointly controlled 548 primarily industrial properties containing 162.7 million rentable sq ...
Corporation, KKR Financial Corporation and Ripplewood Holdings. He is also a Director or Trustee of the Economic Club of New York, Tax Foundation, Resources for the Future, Manhattan Council and Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church, New York, and a member of the Advisory Board of the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse... Director of MetLife and Metropolitan Life Insurance Company since February 2007.
Hubbard is currently a board member of:
* Automatic Data Processing
ADP, Inc. (originally an acronym for Automatic Data Processing) is an American provider of human resources management software and services.
History
In 1949, Henry Taub founded Automatic Payrolls, Inc. as a manual payroll processing business wit ...
* Duke Realty
* Ripplewood Holdings
* MetLife Inc.
* FiscalNote
FiscalNote Holdings, Inc., or commonly FiscalNote, is a publicly traded software, data, and media company headquartered in Washington, D.C. The company was founded by Timothy Hwang, Gerald Yao, and Jonathan Chen in 2013. FiscalNote provides softw ...
On January 8, 2019, he was appointed to become MetLife's non-executive chairman of the board as of May 1, 2019, upon the retirement of Steven A. Kandarian.
''Inside Job'' interview and aftermath
Hubbard was interviewed in Charles Ferguson's Oscar-winning documentary film, ''Inside Job
An insider threat is a malicious threat to an organization that comes from people within the organization, such as employees, former employees, contractors or business associates, who have inside information concerning the organization's security ...
'' (2010), discussing his advocacy, as chief economic advisor to the Bush Administration, of deregulation. Ferguson argues that deregulation led to the 2008 international banking crisis sparked by the collapse of Lehman Brothers
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. ( ) was an American global financial services firm founded in 1847. Before filing for bankruptcy in 2008, Lehman was the fourth-largest investment bank in the United States (behind Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, a ...
and the sale of Merrill Lynch
Merrill (officially Merrill Lynch, Pierce, Fenner & Smith Incorporated), previously branded Merrill Lynch, is an American investment management and wealth management division of Bank of America. Along with BofA Securities, the investment bank ...
. In the interview, Ferguson asks Hubbard to enumerate the firms from whom he receives outside income as an advisory board member in the context of possible conflict of interest
A conflict of interest (COI) is a situation in which a person or organization is involved in multiple interests, financial or otherwise, and serving one interest could involve working against another. Typically, this relates to situations i ...
. Hubbard, hitherto cooperative, declines to answer and threatens to end the interview with the remark, "You have three more minutes; give it your best shot." After the release of the film, Columbia ramped up ongoing efforts to strengthen and clarify their conflict of interest disclosure requirements.["'Inside Job' prompts new look at conflict of interest policy,"](_blank)
published April 13, 2011, in the Columbia Spectator. (Columbia Business School professor Michael Feiner, a member of the faculty committee of Columbia's Sanford C. Bernstein and Co. Center for Leadership and Ethics, has recommended that the film be shown to all business school students.)
Books
Hubbard is the author of a number of economic and socioeconomic texts, with a focus on deregulation
Deregulation is the process of removing or reducing state regulations, typically in the economic sphere. It is the repeal of governmental regulation of the economy. It became common in advanced industrial economies in the 1970s and 1980s, as a ...
, conservative fiscal policy
In economics and political science, fiscal policy is the use of government revenue collection (taxes or tax cuts) and expenditure to influence a country's economy. The use of government revenue expenditures to influence macroeconomic variab ...
and taxation
A tax is a compulsory financial charge or some other type of levy imposed on a taxpayer (an individual or legal person, legal entity) by a governmental organization in order to fund government spending and various public expenditures (regiona ...
. In 2009, he wrote and published The Aid Trap with economist William Duggan Columbia University Press
Columbia University Press is a university press based in New York City, and affiliated with Columbia University. It is currently directed by Jennifer Crewe (2014–present) and publishes titles in the humanities and sciences, including the fiel ...
, criticizing the aid system provided by NGOs in western countries as preventing internal growth in poorer nations. In 2013, he published Balance
Balance or balancing may refer to:
Common meanings
* Balance (ability) in biomechanics
* Balance (accounting)
* Balance or weighing scale
* Balance as in equality or equilibrium
Arts and entertainment Film
* ''Balance'' (1983 film), a Bulgaria ...
with former intelligence officer and economist Tim Kane
Timothy Joseph Kane (born April 28, 1968) is an American economist who is the President and Founder of The American Lyceumwww.theamricanlyceum.orga 501(c)(3) organization seeking to promote solution-focused, civic debate. Kane was the JP Conte ...
.
Columbia Business School (CBS) ''Follies''
Hubbard is also frequently featured in skits by Columbia Business School's "Follies" group, ranging from videos of him monitoring students on classroom video cameras to songs about his relationship with Presidential candidate Mitt Romney. Hubbard has also publicized his dissatisfaction with Ben Bernanke
Ben Shalom Bernanke ( ; born December 13, 1953) is an American economist who served as the 14th chairman of the Federal Reserve from 2006 to 2014. After leaving the Fed, he was appointed a distinguished fellow at the Brookings Institution. Durin ...
's nomination as Chair of the Federal Reserve
The chair of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System is the head of the Federal Reserve, and is the active executive officer of the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System. The chair shall preside at the meetings of the Boa ...
with his comedic YouTube
YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
parody of The Police
The Police were an English rock band formed in London in 1977. For most of their history the line-up consisted of primary songwriter Sting (lead vocals, bass guitar), Andy Summers (guitar) and Stewart Copeland (drums, percussion). The Polic ...
's "Every Breath You Take
"Every Breath You Take" is a song by the English rock band the Police from their album ''Synchronicity'' (1983). Written by Sting, the single was the biggest US and Canadian hit of 1983, topping the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 singles chart for eig ...
", titled "Every Breath Bernanke Takes".
References
External links
Faculty page at Columbia University
Scholar page at the American Enterprise Institute
*
Election Central Guide to 2008
Inside Job – Documentary Site at Sony.com
Personal Website and Archive
, -
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hubbard, Glenn
1958 births
American Presbyterians
Business school deans
Columbia Business School faculty
Florida Republicans
George W. Bush administration personnel
Harvard Graduate School of Arts and Sciences alumni
Living people
People from Apopka, Florida
People from Orlando, Florida
Supply-side economists
University of Central Florida alumni
National Bureau of Economic Research
Economists from Florida
21st-century American economists
Chairs of the United States Council of Economic Advisers
MetLife people