Correction appended
Several University alumni and professors appointed to serve in President Obama’s administration have divulged personal financial details in a series of recently released public financial disclosure reports.
Among the most significant of these disclosures is that, on top of a salary of $369,807 from January 1, 2008, to March 9, 2009, Wilson School professor and nominee for assistant treasury secretary Alan Krueger received more than $160,000 as an advance payment from MacMillan Publishers for his “Explorations in Economics” textbook.
Under the Ethics in Government Act of 1978, high-ranking members of the executive branch are required to disclose intimate details of their personal finances, including salaries and assets. The act covers several University-affiliated individuals, including Krueger, Solicitor General Elena Kagan ’81, Director of the Office of Management and Budget Peter Orszag ’91, Deputy Secretary of Defense William Lynn GS ’82 and economics professor Cecilia Rouse, who serves on Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers.
The tax returns reveal that Krueger further supplemented his income through a series of lectures and speeches at Thailand’s Chulalongkorn University, earning $10,000 over the course of two days. A speech at Goldman Sachs earned him another $7,000, and he was paid $5,000 and $2,500 for presentations at the Syfr Corporation and the Swedish Education Ministry, respectively.
He also earned a total of $53,000 for serving on the boards of the Russell Sage Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation and the American Institutes for Research.
Though Krueger’s University salary is more than double the average salary of a full Princeton professor, Kagan’s salary as dean of Harvard Law School was even larger, totaling $437,299. The Goldman Sachs Global Markets Institute added another $10,000 stipend for her position on its advisory council. Kagan also reported receiving several payments from Harvard, the University of Chicago and Vanguard Funds, none of which exceeded $100,000 in value. Kagan has given up her position as dean to serve as solicitor general.
Rouse’s tax forms showed she also earned significant income on top of her University salary, which totals $300,807, though Rouse will be taking a leave of absence from the University to take up her new job advising Obama. The Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory provided her with another, undisclosed salary, while consulting for the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Hartford Public School District and the University of Florida earned her more than $80,000 in total.
Rouse also received $12,000 from Penn as an honorarium.
From 2002 until his appointment as deputy secretary of defense, Lynn held the position of senior vice president at Raytheon, the world’s largest producer of guided missiles, for which he earned a salary of $369,615 in 2008. He has also already negotiated a deal with the defense contractor for a $4,300 monthly pension starting in 2019.
Ethics regulations required Lynn to give up nearly 10,000 shares in Raytheon stock when he left the company to take up his new post, yet Lynn reported assets from the shares amounting to between $750,000 and $1.5 million in the company’s stock in 2008.
Forty-year-old Orszag is the youngest member of the president’s cabinet. As head of the Congressional Budget Office in the last year of the administration of former president George W. Bush, Orszag drew attention to the harm rising health care costs would do to the government’s budget and to the nation’s economy as a whole.
Though the only exact figure Orszag reported in his returns was the $23,079.31 he earned as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, he also documented receiving income of more than $5,000 from Georgetown University as a research professor, from Washington’s FTI Consulting Group and as a speaker for Alcoa and the Korean Development Institute in Seoul.
Correction
An earlier version of this article stated these figures came from tax returns. In fact, they came from public financial disclosure reports. It also made reference to Alan Krueger's annual salary, when in fact the salary covered a 15-month period.
Read More
Asbestos removal work continues from prior summer in 1901-Laughlin Hall
Ben GoldstonAsbestos is currently being removed from 1901-Laughlin Hall as part of ongoing summer renovations. The dorm is vacant, and air quality tests have confirmed levels remain below EPA safety thresholds.
Asbestos is currently being removed from 1901-Laughlin Hall as part of ongoing summer renovations. The dorm is vacant, and air quality tests have confirmed levels remain below EPA safety thresholds.
Head of DC comics among eight alumni elected to 2025–2026 Board of Trustees
Vitus LarrieuEight alumni have been selected to join the Board of Trustees from July 1, including president, publisher, and chief creative officer of DC Comics Jim Lee. Six former trustees ended their terms on June 30, increasing the total number of trustees to 39.
Eight alumni have been selected to join the Board of Trustees from July 1, including president, publisher, and chief creative officer of DC Comics Jim Lee. Six former trustees ended their terms on June 30, increasing the total number of trustees to 39.
Andrew Houck ’00 will be new Dean of Engineering and Applied Science
Devon RudolphThe Daily Princetonian spoke to Andrew Houck ’00, the new Dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, about his commitment to rebuilding the deteriorating relationship between higher education and the federal government, as well as his goals of restoring the public's faith in the sciences.
The Daily Princetonian spoke to Andrew Houck ’00, the new Dean of the School of Engineering and Applied Science, about his commitment to rebuilding the deteriorating relationship between higher education and the federal government, as well as his goals of restoring the public;s faith in the sciences.