Four presidential advisory councils disbanded because some members were outraged about President Donald Trump’s analysis of the Aug. 12, 2017, violence in Charlottesville, Va. and/or succumbed to pressure to disassociate themselves from him.
For a few days, the media breathlessly reported news about individual council members resigning as if they were U.S. senators condemning Trump one by one. Given the headlines, those advisory councils seemed very important, but the media ignored a major topic in its reporting — what do these councils actually do?
Certainly, the business leaders on the councils could have made recommendations for policies that later became significant laws. Did they?
If past councils have been significant, the media was correct in producing a lot of stories about the resignations from the now disbanded American Manufacturing Council and the Strategic and Policy Forum as well as the termination of the Presidential Advisory Council on Infrastructure while it was being formed. In addition, a fourth advisory council that wasn’t involved in business issues called the President’s Committee on the Arts and the Humanities disbanded, and several members of a Department of Commerce committee called the Digital Economy Board of Advisers resigned.
If past councils have been insignificant, the media failed because it didn’t put the resignations in context.
A Long History
There are so many councils, committees, and other groups that advise the American president as well as Congress and other federal entities that there is an encyclopedia listing them called the Encyclopedia of Governmental Advisory Organizations.
The encyclopedia, which is unavailable online if you haven’t registered for it, “profiles 8,0161 permanent, continuing, and ad hoc advisory committees of all kinds” and includes “detailed information about historically significant committees.” Wealth Authority was unable to find out how many of the advisory councils advise presidents on business and economics issues (or whether the overall number is 80,161 or a number closer to 8,000), but its research shows the number is very significant.
The Obama administration, for example, had 28 trade advisory committees. 306 of the 566 people on those committees were business executives, and 174 worked for trade associations who “attend private meetings with administration officials and get access to documents that the public cannot see.” Thus, these committees favor business interests.
Presidential advisory councils on business-related topics have existed since at least 1934, when Franklin Delano Roosevelt was president and a 23-member advisory council was formed to give advice to the Committee on Economic Security (CES), which consisted of five of FDR’s Cabinet-level officials.
“The CES was really the key to the development of Social Security in America in the crucial months between June 1934 and January 1935,” according to the Social Security website, which details the advisory council’s members but not the council’s specific contributions.
Finding analyses of the significance of presidential advisory councils on economics and business is difficult. In fact, finding the names of them is even harder, and generally requires using the Any Time/Custom range function on Google to, for example, find a Bill Clinton presidential council during his 1993-2001 term in office and a George W. Bush presidential council during his 2001-2009 term in office.
Examples of Councils
Here are some examples of presidential advisory councils on economics-related matters:
Ronald Reagan: President Reagan had an Economic Policy Advisory Board that regularly advised the administration on domestic and international economic policy. Most of them were very well-known former government officials. Business execs were barely represented.
Bill Clinton: The President’s Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD) worked from 1993 to 1999. International economic development expert Crescencia Maurer wrote that the council’s “crown jewel” was a report that detailed a strategy for the USA to balance economic growth with environmental and economic equity concerns. Executives from Browning-Ferris, Chevron, Dow Chemical, Enron, and General Motors were on the council, said Maurer’s report.
George W. Bush: Chaired by Chuck Schwab, the President’s Advisory Council on Financial Literacy was created in 2008 while Bush was the president. It was renamed the President’s Advisory Council on Financial Capability in 2010 by the Obama administration. Council member Amy Rosen wrote in 2013 that the council was trying to make financial education a crucial part of children’s education. It produced a report accessed by more than 600,000 Americans that detailed what children should know about financial concepts at specific ages, and provided information that teachers are using in financial education lessons.
Barack Obama: The President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board was created in 2009, and renamed the President’s Council on Jobs and Competitiveness in 2011. GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney blasted the council for meeting only once in 2012, and it was disbanded in 2013. However, ABC reported that the council’s recommendations on energy efficiency, aid to small businesses, tourism promotion and 13 other issues, were implemented. Prominent CEOs dominated the council, which was chaired by General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt.
Trump has been president for only seven months, so it’s unfair to judge how effective his disbanded councils were. The American Manufacturing Council met once. The Strategic and Policy Forum met twice. The San Diego Union-Tribune reported that neither council accomplished much, but Blackstone CEO Steve Schwarzman, the Strategic and Policy Forum’s chairperson, said his council had ambitious goals for regulations, taxes, trade, women in the workplace, infrastructure, and education.
“In each of those areas, we’ll get suggestions, ways to make things happen, happen faster to improve the country,” he said before his council disbanded.
Based on this information, the only logical conclusion is that these councils serve purely an advisory role, and don’t seem to have much effect on actionable legislation. Perhaps the media is once again overreacting?
Regards,
Ethan Warrick
Editor
Wealth Authority
